WATER POLLUTION

Water is affected by many kinds of hazardous materials. Normally, water can replenish itself by breaking down, diluting, and settling out the wastes. But when too much of some kind of substance enters the water, it is too much for the water to handle and causes pollution. Water pollution can be separated into two different categories, point and non point sources. Point source pollution is any type of pollution that can be identified as coming from a clearly established source. This may be a factory, a previously polluted stream, or other source that is obviously causing pollution. Point source pollution problems are often simpler to control because it's easier to see the cause of the pollution and to do something about it. Nonpoint source pollution problems are more difficult to resolve because they often cannot be traced to one specific location. It includes sediment from rainwater runoff or fertilizer pollution as storms wash nutrients from fields. It can also be runoff from animal wastes, construction sites or mines, and leachate from landfills. It could even be acid rain from atmospheric pollutants that falls to earth in polluted rain or snow and contaminates water bodies.

There are many different classes of water pollutants; biodegradable wastes, plant nutrients, heat, sediments, hazardous and toxic chemicals, and radioactive wastes. These all combine together in the water and pollute it. Its not just one or the other, that’s why it is so hazardous to people and animals. It is a proven fact by the World Bank study in 1995 that 80% of all diseases are caused by polluted water in developing countries. There are about 10 million casualties every year. With all these toxic chemicals in the water, fish and other organisms obtain them. It goes through a long, widespread food web where each part is contracted with the chemicals. The main part is when humans eat the fish. This is where the diseases come from. DDT, PCBs, radioactive isotopes, and mercury all come through this and come in contact with humans and make them sick.

An enforcement on cleaning up water in the United States was started in the late 1940s called the Clean Water Act. Nothing could really be done because the government was strictly limited to matters involving interstate waters and only with the consent of the state in which the pollution originated. During the latter half of the 1950s and well into the 1960s, water pollution control programs were shaped by four laws which amended the 1948 statute. They dealt largely with federal assistance to municipal dischargers and with federal enforcement programs for all dischargers. During this period, the federal role and federal jurisdiction were gradually extended to include navigable intrastate, as well as interstate, waters. Water quality standards became a feature of the law in 1965, requiring states to set standards for interstate waters that would be used to determine actual pollution levels.

The 1972 legislation confirmed a proposal for the return and maintenance of the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters. There were two goals that were established during this time which were a zero discharge of pollutants by 1985 and, as a short-term goal and where possible, water quality that is both "fishable" and "swimmable" by mid-1983. While those dates have passed, the goals remain, and efforts to attain them continue.

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Copywrited by Brian Smith