Figure 3. This chart shows the percentage of the causes of North Sea pollution in England and Wales in 1995. Sewage and oil pollutions account for nearly half of total sea pollution.
Sewage dumping
There are many countries and so much people living around the North Sea. What happens to their waste? They dump them into the sewage, and then discharge it into the river. There are 1360 million litres of sewage dumped into the rivers each day in Britain alone. The wastes are then being moved into the North Sea at the end. Raw sewage in the North Sea is usually untreated, including excrement, plastics, and sanitary items etc. It is reported that direct raw sewage dumping account for approximately 50% of nutrient pollution in the sea.
The polluted water can cause disease in wildlife and bathers too. Acute health risks may include stomach upsets, eye infections and skin rashes. More seriously, chronic health risks would cause the diseases such as typhoid, salmonellas and polio and seafood contamination. An increase in bacteria as a result of the presence of sewage can take in oxygen from the water, consequently causing the dying of fishes and other marine lives due to shortage of oxygen in the water.
Industry
Many industries have been built near the North Sea, a potential threat to the sea. Industries give out unwanted waste products including chemicals, heavy metals and other bad things and discharge them into the river and sea. Also, the industries pump out unwanted oil waste into the river stream, as a main source of oil pollution in the sea. The wildlife can be killed; fish can be poisoned immediately after taking in the oil and chemicals. If sea bird wings are full of oil, they will sink in water, due to the oil ceasing the waterproof ‘coat’ on the birds.
In addition, the oil pollution comes from the ships as well in different ways, including natural ‘leaks’ discharges of fuel oil from the ships, spillages from oil refineries, oilrigs, and tanker accidents. According to a survey, 32% of the North Sea pollution is from oil tanker operations and other shipping. The accidents have occurred for many times for past few decades, which have caused disastrous damages to the wildlife in the North Sea. For instant, in 1977, a major oil spill from the Ekofisk oil field leaked 31,040 tonnes into the North Sea. Again in 1993, the oil tanker Braer spilled 85,000 tonnes of oil into the North Sea near the Shetland Islands off Scotland. Illegally washing the oil tankers also occurs quite often. Heavy oil pollution not only greatly threats to the wildlife, but also damages beautiful beach where swimming and sun bathing become impossible.
There are also power stations linking to the river, where the water extracted for cooling purpose is returned into the river with higher temperature. Many people do not see any harm in discharging the warm water into rivers and seas. In fact, rising temperature of the water could be uninhabitable for some sea animals. It has been reported that the temperatures in the North Sea were two degrees higher on average over the past decade, which is too warm for the cod. This would be one of the reasons for reduction of the number of the cod in the North Sea. A sudden withdraw of the warmer water release from the power station for some reasons would kill the local fish in the river due to the temperature sharply dropping down.
Deep-water dredging for minerals results in about 97% waste material being thrown back into the sea. It can too harm the river life because the water is also sometimes poisonous, with less oxygen than usual.
Agriculture run-off
Agriculture run-off is the farm wastes that spread on farmlands. Agriculture run-off includes Nitrates and fertilisers, Pesticides and Growth hormones. Fertilisers build up algae that use up the oxygen in water and left no oxygen for fish. Pesticides are poisonous, which will kill sea animals. The chemicals can reach the river and sea by heavy rain. The fertiliser will find its way from underground flowing into the river and reaching to the sea eventually. The chemicals (undiluted farm slurry) are actually 100 times more polluting than raw sewage, and silage effluent is 200 times more polluting. Although agriculture run-off comes indirectly into the North Sea, it is still taking a big part in the pollution.
Atmospheric pollution
The very bad atmospheric pollution makes the North Sea pollution even worse. According to a statistic research, air pollution is account for 33% of the North Sea pollution. Air pollutants eventually are blown into the sea. The more atmospheric pollution we make on land, the more the sea is affected. Both radioactive fallout and acid rain also belong to this category. Acid rain is formed by sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, which are released into the air by burning fossil fuels and car exhaust fumes. The bad stuffs build up in the sea leading to a great threat to the marine animal. The radioactive materials can enter food chain and cause disease in marine life and eventually the bad items will pass to human by eating the seafood.
Over fishing
Though over fishing is not the category of pollution, it is surely a great threat for marine life cycle. An investigation has shown that industrial fishing in Denmark is account for 50% of the declining catch from the North Sea each year. A report from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAD) suggests that all the world’s major fishing grounds are now at, or beyond their biological limits. Cod faces total elimination in North Sea due to both over fishing and heavy pollution.
III. FUTURE OPTOINS FOR THE MANAGEMENT OF THE NORTH SEA
We can see from the above information that it is extremely serious that the North Sea has been polluted very badly. We must act effectively to save the dying sea where we all rely on for our daily life. Both government and polluters should take an immediate action to reduce the pollution by making and obeying the necessary laws. A punishment should be taken if any one breaks the laws. Also, an award should be granted to the people or country that has done a great effort to save the North Sea.
Direct raw sewage could be reduced or stopped by treatment processes before dumping into the sea. It would prevent solid stuff and poisonous items into the sea and decrease the amount of pollution effectively. The treated sewage somehow could be used as fertiliser on the farmland. Education should be given to the public to separate their rubbish from the something which could be recycled.
There must be tighter restrictions to reduce industrial wastes discharging into the North Sea. It could process a treatment as well to break down the chemicals and heavy metals before going to the sea. Also, it is absolutely necessary to make a law to limit oil waste from the ships. No washing out an oil tank is admitted in the sea and an accident for oil release from the oil tank or ship should be heavily penalized. In addition, every country should have an effective emergency facility and training to act immediately on the oil disaster.
Agriculture run-off could be significantly improved by encouraging farmers to use natural methods instead of fertilisers and pesticides. Public should be educated to realize that fertilising food is not good for their health and more natural food definitely will benefit them.
As mentioned early that acid rain is caused by heavy waste fumes from the industry and car. An effective action must be taken to maximum limit the atmospheric pollution by enforcing a reduction of release of the dirty fuels from the factories. It is also very important to educate car drivers to take public transports as much as they can to decrease the air pollution, consequently reduce the sea pollution.
It is very important to reach an international agreement in Europe on the laws to protect the North Sea from further pollution. A positive attitude toward saving the North Sea would be required across Europe. Every one should take one’s responsibility to the North Sea. Many people may still do not realize how serious their ignorance on rubbish discharging has caused such huge damage on the wildlife in the North Sea. Therefore, it is very necessary to educate the public to be care and maintain the natural environment. The correct attitude is such important that the value of it would benefit not only our generation but also following generations.
IV. CONCLUSION
In this enquiry I have attempted to answer the following question ‘Why is the North Sea referred as the cesspit of Europe’. In order to obtain an answer to the main enquiry, I broke it up into several mini–enquiry questions. By answering each mini–question, I was able to work out the answer to the main question. In finding my answer I consulted a range of different sources of evidence. Using a range of sources enabled me to arrive at a balanced and accurate argument.
This enquiry has suggested that the pollution in the North Sea is absolutely serious and some wildlife is facing elimination. There are many factors causing the pollution, including direct raw sewage pumping, industrial waste discharging, oil spillage, agriculture run-off, and atmospheric pollution. It involves many countries, such as UK, France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Norway, Denmark, and probably Czech Republic. Even some of them are not on the bound of the North Sea; they are still responsible for the pollution because the wastes discharged into the river can eventually travel into the sea. The Rivers linking to the North Sea include Tee, Humber, Thames, Schelde, Rhine, Ems, Weser, and Elbe, from all the different countries around the North Sea.
Obviously, both government and polluters are responsible for the polluted sea. Governments in Europe have not paid enough attention to the pollution and have not taken immediate and effective action to save the North Sea since first warning in 1967. The polluters include many groups of people and involve almost everyone living in Europe, for example fishing men, farmers, industrial bosses and workers, even people like us. People’s ignorance and careless of the natural environment has led to disaster for the wildlife in the sea. Eventually human being will face the same disaster as the sea life due to destroyed nature and poisoned sea food. So all of us should be responsible for the polluted North Sea and an immediate action should be taken to save the badly damaged sea.
In the last decades, the North Sea has been polluted badly not just due to the human daily wrong activity as discussed above but also the disastrous accidents in the sea. Just in two oil pollution events in 1977 and 1993, there had been 116,040 tonnes of oil exposed to the sea. The huge amount of oil suddenly leaked into the sea has caused incredible crisis to the wildlife, which is irreversible damage to the sea.
Even though the accidents caused the sea pollution so badly, the oil tank cannot be banned because human need it to take in and transport oil. We do not have enough oil left to use, so that we HAD to use oil tanks in the North Sea. Maybe in the future, we can stop this action, as we will be able to make other types of energy to use, and not to damage the environment.
The importance of preventing pollution is apparent with the wildlife facing extinction in the North Sea. It is all made by our human and thus, we must take an immediate and effective action to stop our wrongdoing and do our best to save wildlife. A correct attitude is crucial in protection and maintain of the sea biological environment. The value of it is invaluable.
If we all act together to protect our North Sea, it will not be called as the cesspit of Europe but our beautiful heaven.
V. EVALUATION
I think I have done well in planning, organization, and writing up in this project. I have searched a lot of websites to try to find more information on the North Sea pollution. I think I did a good job in summary it up in the conclusion section too.
Next time, I would improve the part of researching multimedia. I haven’t found much graphs, charts, and maps to go along with my project. In the next project, I would like to expend my research area more so that I can find all the information I need.
I have found the subject matter of North Sea pollution enquiry quite interesting because world pollution take a big part in our lives today and human being should learn how to care the Earth.
I like this style of learning, where we have the freedom to research on our own, because it encourages us to learn independently and to search the information ourselves.
In this project, I have learnt about how serious sea pollution can be and what factors are causing it to happen. I had not even heard of sea pollution before and I did learn a lot in this enquiry.
Another thing I learnt is how to plan and organize an enquiry, and how to ask mini questions before starting a research. Also, I have learnt how to search in a variety of sources, including the Internet, books, encyclopaedias, and leaflets.
I think I have obtained National Curriculum Level 6 because I have included enough detail about the pollution situation and used a range of skills and sources to help me. I did not have enough graphs and tables. I have put in few geographical vocabularies into the project. My mini-questions are relevant to the main enquiry question and were raised sensibly.
VI: BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books
Frump R. Until the Sea Shall Free Them, Doubleday; ISBN: 0385501161; (May 2002)
Kruize R.R. North Sea Pollution - Technical Strategies for Improvement, Pergamon Press; ASIN: 0080418368; (January 1992)
MacGarvin M. The Greenpeace Book of the North Sea (Greenpeace - the Seas of Europe), Collins and Brown; ISBN: 1855850052; (September 1990)
Manners I. R. North Sea Oil and Environmental Planning: The UK Experience, University of Texas Pr; ISBN: 0292764758; (May 1982)
Salomons W. Pollution of the North Sea: An Assessment, Springer Verlag; ASIN: 0387192883; (February 1989)
Internet
CD-ROM
Encarta Reference Library 2002 CD, Microsoft, ASIN: B00005NYFE, CD-ROM - 5 October 2001
Encyclopaedia Britannica 2003 Deluxe Edition CD, Britannica, ASIN: B00006FXD2, CD-ROM - 20 September 2002
Hutchinson Encyclopaedia 2002, Focus Multimedia Ltd, ASIN: B00005QBQO, CD-ROM - 28 September 2001
