Noah Swart

Blog Topic

Cinci/Clev Air

Mr. Moss

Smog

  When it comes to the quality of day to day life our clean air is actually a very important thing. Most people don’t really think about how clean their air is compared to the more populated places of the world. Some cities are completely covered in smog, causing air quality problems for generations to come. In certain places it gets so bad that people will wear an air filter to protect their health. This smog and overall bad air quality is due to the cost of industrial advancement at the cost

of the environment and even the health of a big chunk of the population. Although a lot of the extremely polluted cities are in the countries of China and India the United States isn’t exempt from criticism. The United States has a few cities that have dangerous levels of air pollution, LA being an easy example in the growing problems air pollution can have on the environment. Although the United States in recent years have been making steps to clean up air quality and hopefully protect future air quality.

Cleveland

  When it comes to the large clusters of Midwestern cities most people assume that they’d be the ones most effected by air pollution, as the Midwest is a big industrial supplier to much of the United States. Ohio being probably one of the big Midwestern states and having a border all along the Appalachian Mountains an area known for its mountain blasting. The Two cities come into question, those cities are those of Cincinnati, which borders the bottom left border of Ohio and Cleveland standing by the great lakes at the top of the state’s border. Being very big cities both with a hand in the industrial industry you have an easy case to compare the two and see how location and weather can have an effect on air quality. Using the Ohio EPA – Air Quality Chart one can check the current air quality status of both cities. Both currently have a green check for good air quality, but with Cincinnati having a PM AQI of 45 and an Ozone AQI of 38 compared to Cleveland’s PM AQI at 44 and Ozone AQI at 46. You can see that the difference between the two is very small, and both cities have a very positive air quality. Overall to compare Cincinnati has a more positive air quality but neither has any real potential for later adverse health effects.   

Noah Swart

Blog Topic –

 Is round up harmful?

Mr. Moss                           

Round-Up

   Is roundup harmful? That’s a complicated question, as roundup is a pesticide thus its intent is that it is harmful to the environment. Roundup is used to kill weeds and other unwanted plants and has quite the perfect record when it comes to just that, killing something. Pesticides have never had a good history with being healthy to the public, the government has had a long history with banning pesticides and other harmful toxins. With all the bureaucracy that goes into toxin bans the removal of pesticides from the market is surprising. Showing that if the government ban’s it then it must be really toxic to the public.

   Round-up is produced by the Monsanto Company which has a long history with both unethical behavior and poor health oversight. Monsanto was known for seeding and growth hormone production before their crown jewel Round-Up was made. Round-Up came on the market in the 1974 and it didn’t become a household weed killer until the late 1990’s. Its introduction was right after the DDT ban and the United States still was in the use of many worse chemicals. As strict pesticide regulations would brought about the popularity of Round-Up surged.

Toxic Crops?

   Now in the modern day Round-Up is still widely used, but evidence has started to emerge about the safety of such a chemical. Round-Up is used widely in agricultural production and even in the use as a desiccate to dry out the crops for a more fertile planting season. This means, Round-Up is used widely in the production of food in the United States, corn being the king crop in most mid-American regions. Monsanto has been found falsifying data on Round-Ups safety. It has been marketed as an environmentally friendly pesticide and Monsanto has pushed to get it used in federal and state parks.

  With all the ethically questionable trouble, Monsanto has gone through the question really presents itself, is Round-Up harmful? The answer is an easy yes. Recently a chemical called Glyphosate which is an active chemical in Round-Up has been found to be a carcinogen. This came as a surprise as Monsanto touts Round-Up as “environmentally friendly” and “biodegradable”. With the widespread use in crops all around the world. The question isn’t “is Round-Up harmful?” but just how Round-Up will affect us in the future, and if it isn’t banned quickly could it have a massive effect on the public health of the future? 

Noah Swart

Blog Topic

Nuclear Run-off

Mr. Moss

Abandoned Chernobyl

   Nuclear reactors are always a big controversial topic, most people are not properly informed about Nuclear Power. To most name nuclear is almost never a positive term. Factors like these are what lead to calls for the removal of nuclear energy when a big reactor meltdown happens. These melt downs can expose millions to nuclear radioactive chemicals and can destroy the wildlife. Health effects of a nuclear meltdown can last tens of thousands of years and completely ruin parts of land for both humans and all living things.

Fukushima Disaster

   There are different forms of nuclear meltdowns, the cases themselves can vary on the severity of the problem. These meltdowns can be due to oversights such as the case of Chernobyl or due to natural disasters in the case of Fukushima. The effect of a meltdown usually occurs when nuclear waste is leaked through water systems and in the air. In Chernobyl it’s said that the nuclear fallout had such a wide range of land exposure that the true effects can’t be determined without more technological advancement.

   Humans who are exposed to the direct nuclear exposure, such as workers on the plant in the time of a meltdown or the people who live nearby in a town can experience radiation sickness. Those with large amounts of exposure can expect to experience Acute Radiation Syndrome which changes the natural process of human cells and molecules, usually resulting in vomiting, coma and eventually death. Humans and animals exposed to radiation sickness can experience birth mutations, and possibly miscarriages.

Radiation has huge effects on the environment, changing birth patterns in animals, destroying plant life and leaking into water streams which can carry these effects thousands of miles downstream. One effect of radiation on plant life is that it causes the plant life to go in a sort of self-defense mode which can be DNA replication and stress responses to cell death. One of the biggest problems with Ionizing Radiation is we don’t know the full effects it can have, and as more disasters happen we learn more and more about the dangers of nuclear reactors.