Environmentalism Flashcards
What were the primary concerns about environmentalism?
industrial air
water pollution
What is Environmental justice?
those who have to pay for the cost of polution without having the ability to escape it
Love Canal
A chemical disaster on the US side of niagra falls
- William T love wanted to build canal connecting lake erie and lake ontario, it was abandoned and used as a toxic waste dump for many years by the Hooker company. they sold it to an education board for $1 who build a school, houses followed. tests were done and 400 chemicals were found, 950 families had to evacuate.
this was the first community based environmental actavism: the Love Canal homeowners Association protested for environmental justice
raised public awareness for health around the great lakes
Carcinogenicity
toxic compounds in water that cause cancer
Mutagenicity
toxins in lakes that cause birth defects in animals and humans
International justice system
they encouraged people to clean the lakes up
the public pressured the IJS to do more to help out, so they called for toxins to stop being dumped into the great lakes
Acid Rain
happens when fossil fuel emissions are mixed in with water vapour
Canadian government pressured the US government to sign the US Canada air quality agreement in 1991
it reduced acid rain emissions by 50%
Sydney Tar ponds
happened in the muggah creek estuary
the tar ponds were created by the coke ovens, chemical substances like mercury and lead were found in lobsters
Coke ovens
Coal was baked in ovens at high temperatures to remove substances like tar, water, gas, to make a pure coal that burns hot.
it was stored in tanks next to the estuary and got into the water source when it was abandoned.
it was 35x more toxic than love canal, known as canada’s worst contaminated site.
clean up of Muggah Creek estuary
the discovery of contaminiaon closed the oven in 1988
the government tried getting rid of the toxins by pumping it through pipelines to be burnt, that didn’t work, so they tried to burn it on site, got in trouble due to health concerns, so they jsut poured concrete over it and put a park on top, called it good.
- this shows the perminant actions the industry has on the environment.
Grassy Narrows disaster
90% of people got mercury poisoning
Dryden chemical Ltd was dumping mercury into the river
they had a chlor-alkali plant that bleached paper, dumping murcury into the river, untreated causing birth defects.
1962-1970
in 1970, Ontario banned types of fishing, sport, and indigenous cultural fishing
- people protested against the decades long poisoning of the environment.
Ozone Depletion
Molina and Rowland studdied the effects of Chlorflurocarbon CFC molecules that could be sent up to the stratisphere to break down the ozone layer, allowing more UV rays to come in
where did scientists discover a hole in the ozone layer?
around the poles, a decrease of ozone molecule concentration
fear of a thin ozone layer
there was a collective fear about the decreasing ozone layer. it causes cancer, crop failure and warmer temperatures.
1985 Vienna convention
protecting the ozone layer collectively
the only UN treaty that every nation on earth has agreed on.
countries helped each other out by sharing information, helping each other to take responsibility for this ecological problem.
montreal protocol
in 1987, they regulate the substances that deplete ozone layers.
