Why is it an issue?
Indoor and outdoor air quality is important Indoor because we breathe about 5,000 gallons of air daily and spend about 90% of our time indoors. Everyone's health is affected by indoor air quality, but children and the elderly are at higher risk of adverse effects.
There are many substances in the air that may affect community and environmental health, or reduce visibility. Substances not naturally found in the air or at greater concentrations than usual are referred to as 'pollutants.’ Pollutants, when present at high enough concentrations, produce harmful effects on people and/or the environment. In the table below, it is clearly visible as to why air quality is an issue. Not only are the health effects detrimental, but also could lead to serious repercussions to the future generations if it isn’t stopped now.
In addition to ozone, photochemical smog contains a number of other harmful secondary pollutants, which are severe irritants, particularly to the eyes. (Ironically, ozone in the stratosphere is essential for life, as we know it. This ozone layer prevents much of the sun's harmful ultraviolet light reaching us.)
Australians on average spend about ninety-five percent of their time indoors and many pollutants occur at higher concentrations indoors than outdoors because of the materials and appliances used in buildings.
Many people’s main exposure to air pollutants occurs when they are indoors, such as at home, in the workplace or in entertainment venues.
Researchers are working towards measuring ‘individual exposure’ to pollutants. That is, a measure of the actual exposure that people have to air pollutants during their daily routines, rather than measures of pollution at fixed locations.
Solutions and management
- Clean air that is fit to breathe is one of the key factors required to deliver a safe environment for both current and future generations. Air quality management is managing the air as a natural resource and understanding the sources that contribute to our atmospheric makeup and controlling those sources, to some extent, to improve air quality. The field involves the measurement and monitoring, transport and fate, and laws and regulations related to the air we breath, both indoors and outdoors. Strategies that could be used to reduce pollution include:
- Increasing the use of public transport
- Restrict new housing developments if access to public transport cannot be gained
- Providing more transit and bus lanes to make conditions for buses as satisfying as possible
- Implement stricter emission controls for motor vehicles and industry
- Provide rewards and incentives for research into renewable energy technologies
- Provide financial incentives for houses to install solar hot water heaters
- Use the ‘polluter pays’ principle, whereby people pay for the pollution that they produce.
Local councils have participated in campaigns for the reduction in solid fuel heaters, education campaigns for local businesses and have acted on complaints from the community about air quality impacts. Government legislation and tighter emission controls by industry have produced a marked improvement in air quality in many parts of the world. Many methods of lowering emissions have been developed.
In Australia, the emphasis is on prevention and early identification of air quality problems.
Domestic burning off adds to air pollution. In Australian cities, many municipalities have banned the use of incinerators. Agricultural and forest management practices that do not involve burning can also reduce the release of visibility-reducing particles.
However, motor vehicles present a significant and growing air pollution threat and are Australia’s single greatest source of atmospheric pollutants.
Since 1986, new cars in Australia have had catalytic converters in their exhaust systems. These converters reduce the amounts of oxides of nitrogen, carbon monoxide and unburnt petrol escaping into the air. Use of unleaded petrol is lowering the amount of lead in the urban environment.
Industrial activity, power generation and vehicle numbers in Australia are still increasing. Action today will help prevent us suffering the major air pollution problems currently being experienced in many other parts of the world.
Land Management
What is the issue?
Land management is one of the most important branches of agriculture consisting in cultivation of industrial, fodder and other plants. For centuries, natural cycles of fire, water flow, and weather shaped the habitats we see today. Now roads, development, and other human disturbances have fragmented the landscape. These natural cycles can no longer happen on their own, and it is up to land managers to re-create them to preserve our unique species and habitats. Examples of land management activities include: securing property boundaries, implementing prescribed fires, removing invasive plants, restoring hydrological cycles, and creating public access trails. These practices maintain healthy sanctuaries and often restore areas that have been disturbed or neglected. A land manager can be thought of as a doctor for the land, curing ailments and maintaining overall health. Land management has a spatial dimension as we can map the extent of land degradation and locate areas with particular problems and an ecological dimension.
Why is it an issue?
In many areas, land has become a scarce and contentious resource. Nor is land simply something to be farmed or built upon. Land management is important not only for achievement of maximum personal or community benefit, but also for it’s potential to alter impacts on adjoining areas and water resources. Management of soil, water, nutrients, and other potential contaminants can use a wide range of options, including wetlands, and irrigated areas of vegetation that may include native forests, woodlots, landscaped gardens, hay crops, and vetiver grass. Land management is an important part of conservation because much land is destroyed merely because the owners of land lack the knowledge of how to properly manage the benefits of the property. In most cases, land management is an issue due to land degradation. Land degradation is the decline in quality of the land. Land degradation causes the land to be less able to produce crops, feed animals and renew its natural vegetation. Unsuitable methods of managing the land can often lead to the destruction of the land and such activities lead to widespread land degradation.
Another reason accounting for the issue of land management is due to salinity. Salinity is affecting Australia’s most productive land, such as wheat areas in Western Australia, rice fields in New South Wales and fruit and dairying regions in central and northern Victoria. Soil salting creates farmland that looks very barren and is infertile. Salt kills most plants and the areas usually consist of:
- Trees dying
- Little vegetation cover
- Brown, yellow or wilting vegetation
- Stunted plant growth
- Only salt-tolerant plants managing to survive
Obviously, the effects of salt are more detrimental than they are beneficial, and salinity must be kept to a low to ensure the most productive growth of land.
Solutions and management
Many people are slowly migrating to the coastal strip. Large numbers of people on such small areas places enormous stress on the land. Development is currently being restricted on steep gradients and fore dunes and requires an Environment Impact Statement. These have been placed to reduce soil erosion, sedimentation and mass movement, which all affect the land negatively. Landcare, a community-based program involving groups of landowners and other volunteers working as a team to tackle issues in their local area, have formed strategies to help their land. These include planting special grasses and deep rooting trees, revegetating areas in need and promoting better use of the land.
Water Management
What is the issue?
Proper water management strategy is based on three considerations:
- Which irrigation system should I choose?
- When should I irrigate?
- How much water should I apply?
In regions where rainfall is insufficient and uncertain, irrigation water is essential for profitable crop production. But irrigation is a delicate tool that can endanger the farming system's sustainability (long-term profitability) instead of increasing it: it can be too expensive, can dry out underground water resources, cause irreversible soil property changes, etc.
Why is it an issue?
Water quality problems can occur with wells and springs, especially when associated with poor environmental management. Water management is an issue because water is so vital to the Earth and to living and water is the Earth’s most valuable resource. All life depends on water, and people and animals alike need it for drinking and plants require it to grow. In Australia, however, many of our river systems are in harsh conditions. Though rivers are renewable resource, they can be severely affected by humans. The physical condition of rivers depends a lot on the amount of water taken from them and the amount and type of waste dumped into them. Problems with water quality and reduced flows, due to irrigation and damming, are affecting many of our rivers, which are in turn affecting the people who depend on rivers the most. The desire for clean water and healthy rivers for good health, pleasure and prosperity is virtually impossible in modern times without water management.
Water quality is one of the most important factors in aquaculture systems. Good water quality can decrease stress and thus the occurrence of disease.
Solutions and management
Ways to manage the water include:
Facilitating good management of wetlands, floodplains and river banks
- Working with communities, landholders and governments to conserve significant wetlands on different land tenures using the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands and other partnership agreements;
- Protecting "threatened ecological communities" (communities of different species of plants and animals that function together and are threatened by human practices) under state and federal laws;
- Facilitating on-ground work to recover and manage threatened aquatic species.
Removing and modifying infrastructure such as dams, weirs and levees:
- Advocating allocation of water to rivers and streams at strategic times and places
Waste Management
What is the issue?
Waste Management works toward reduction, reuse and recycling of all resources. By encouraging the reduction of energy consumption, water conservation, the reusing and recycling of products on campus, and alternate transportation methods, the university reduces its environmental impact and operating costs. It is the ongoing control of waste and recyclable material generated by food handing and is an important step in the control of food safety hazards.
Effective waste management ensures that waste and recycling does not accumulate to levels that could contaminate food, ingredients, food packaging (take away containers, etc.) or make the work area unsafe.
A waste manager takes waste from those for whom it has no apparent use and disposes of it under conditions that satisfy society's demand for a clean and safe environment.
Why is it an issue?
Much of the waste created by humans cannot be naturally recycled and most of it is not managed in a sustainable way. Unfortunately, it is dumped in the land, water or atmosphere. Most wastes take a long time to break down and the dumping of wastes cannot possibly continue this way to ensure a biologically friendly future. Landfill sites have major environmental problems associated with them. For example, chemical and other harmful pollutants can leak from the site, contaminating the soil, the groundwater and nearby streams and rivers. Major problems associated with landfill is the fact that they will be used up in a short period of time and other places will be harmed in order to add new space. Water dumped in rivers and oceans causes serious water-quality problems. Sewage from Sydney and many other coastal cities is disposed of in the ocean and storm water drains carry waste into our waterways. Another highly destructive method of destroying waste is to burn it. Almost anything can be changed into smoke, steam and ash and this causes air pollution and releases harmful toxins and dioxins into the atmosphere.
Significant waste management problems include:
- Lack of effective planning and implementation of the resultant plans;
- Ineffective institutional arrangements;
- A lack of sustainable funding;
- Increasing quantities of waste requiring management; and
- A lack of land for undertaking landfill waste disposal
Solutions and Management
Locally, citizens can help by practising the ‘three Rs’ – reduce, re-use and recycle.
The New South Wales government tries to reduce the amount of waste going into landfills by:
- Persuading manufacturers to reduce packaging, re-use products and recycle materials
- Increasing the amount charged to dump waste
- Educating citizens about more effective ways of reducing waste, such as re-using items, recycling and composting.
- Passing legislation, such as the ‘revolutionary controls to reduce industrial waste’ in 1999. This legislation helped to clean up operations because the more they pollute, the more they pay.
It is also important to play an active role in the community and enforce active citizenship.
