Air Pollution in California
Cities like Los Angeles and Houston have been battling poor air quality for decades. Although they have infact made some progress, the issue remains a hot topic of discussion.According to an article I read, overdependence on auto causes 60% of Southern California's infamous smog. It also stated that "In 2004, some 40 percent of national seaborne imports, 235.7 million metric tons, came through the two ports. In 2001, diesel engines of all types--trucks, ships, locomotives, heisters--that carried them through the Port of Los Angeles alone directly pumped out 2.3 tons of tiny soot a day into the region, a study by port officials showed. Not only that but Recent scientific studies have linked these particles to cancer and cardiovascular disease, the country's most pervasive killers." They also conducted a 10-year study, following children growing up in these thick ozone areas. They concluded that the children had 20% less air capacity than those living in cleaner areas. That goes to show that the environment is posing great health concerns for the states. Obviously overpopulation, reliance on automobiles, and booming industrialization has played an import role in this issue. With that, we need to discover solutions to the air pollution problem. I think Carpooling or electric cars could definately help with harmful emissions. What do you think?
Check out these sites for more info
SMOG IN CALIFORNIA
TRAFFIC & SMOG
BREATHE SHALLOWLY
posted by Anonymous @ 2/18/2006 08:42:00 PM
1 Comments:
I think air pollution is kind of a hidden issue because it’s something that we don’t see the direct effects of right away. I think it’s amazing that 2.3 tons of pollution is pumped just into the air in Los Angeles each day from everything that is going on there. I don’t think we see quite those numbers in a city the size of St. Cloud, but I would be curious to sometime investigate and see if I can find a statistic for St. Cloud. I think air pollution is a hard issue to look at because we can’t really see it all in whole in the air. I know we see all the different contributors to it (smog, factories, etc), but it’s tough to put that all together and imagine just how much is really floating around in our air.
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