World Environment Day on June 5 is important for all of us in the global village, specially for those committed to give a human face to environmental issues.
The World Environment Day is a vehicle through which the United Nations encourage worldwide awareness of the environment and political attention thereon. Clean air is a basic need for all living beings.
Purity of air is an important factor of human health. With the industrialisation and urbanisation, air pollution was identified as an environmental problem in Asia and the world over. The warming of the planet is life threatening. The last decade was the hottest in recorded history.
Natural disasters such as drought, famine, storms and melting ice caps increase the ocean levels. Destruction of farmlands, floods, landslides forest fires and pandemic have all been redefined as manmade. already it is forecast that billions of human beings will be affected by them in the near future.
According to scientists a 2 degree celsius rise in global temperature cannot be stopped and all the ice caps in the polar region will be gone by 2013.
Why is it necessary to map out the winds? Could not somebody set up a wind turbine to start producing electricity without the aid of a wind map? Unfortunately it is not so.
The setting up of farms of wind turbines involves careful measuring of the availability of strong winds throughout the year to determine the feasibility of such a project. The problem is that prospective investors would not take pains to go around the country to do that.
Someone has to undertake the task on behalf of the investors, so that investors could start wind farms without wasting time and money according to their choice. The wind power is one of the renewable sources of energy.
Some air pollutants are transported only relatively a short distances from their emission source, others travel at regional hemispheric and global scales and in some cases undergo chemical transformation before deposition.
Their impact on health and the environment was recognised some time ago but more recently it also became clear that there can be an extensive impact on economic sustainability and the prospects for development.
The chief contribution to co2 in the atmosphere is the burning of fossil fuels and by burning these fuels over the last century mankind has emitted more co2 than the planet can withstand.
It should be noted that the reason for the very existence of human life on this planet is the action of plants over millions of years in sequestering atmospheric carbon. These deposits are what we now call fossil fuels which we are returning to the atmosphere and in the process ensuring that conditions that make life on earth impossible are again present. We burn these fuels to produce energy.
The Sustainable Energy Authority has embarked on a project to identify and map out viable sites and their energy potentials for prospective investors to start wind power projects.
The SEA currently focusing on all the data which could be made available to the investors by this year and the wind map would be ready by 2015. These wind maps could be used to study climate changes. They are also needed to instal wind turbines to generate energy. Air pollution could affect the wind currents.
The large scale installation of wind turbines could have a bearing on how clean the air is. Wind maps take the shape of topographical maps. The Sustainable Energy Authority has identified 12 locations across the country where the steady flow of winds is available throughout the year. It would be interesting to make study on climate and environment in areas such as Puttalam, Suriyakanda, Kalametiya in Hungama, Udappuwa, Yala, Pottuvil, Seethaeliya, Habarana and Mannar.
Many factors indicate the fragile base of modern economies and the artificial nature of the entire economic edifice on which growth rests. There is a financial and economic problem that ails the planet.
Although scientific study indicated that by the 1960s mankind impact on the regenerative ability of the earth would be around 70% by 1980. The massive destructive forces unleashed by man had resulted in the planet going beyond its ability to heal itself.
In the current context the following statistics are important to note, 170 human beings are added to the human population worldwide every minute, 100 acres of forests are lost, 45,000 tons of fertile soil is lost, about 42,500 tons of carbon dioxide are added to the atmosphere, given these facts if the earth were able to withstand human destruction and damage it would need to be about 1 1/2 times its present.
In Asia and the Western Pacific region urban outdoor air pollution is held responsible for about half a million premature deaths every year. We must pay more attention to manage air quality because poor air quality affects human health which has its impact on productivity and economic growth. Unless timely action is taken to prevent or minimise air pollution future generations will be deprived of a pollution free environment.
The global economic crisis is the result of the environmental crisis. The current financial problems are likely to ease in the future, unless changes are made in the lifestyles a far greater problem will crop up.
The core reason for the terrible mess that the mankind find itself can be laid squarely at the doorstep of outdated economic principles.
As custodians of the environment we carry ourselves the responsibility to reduce air pollution in the interest of the posterity.
Dealing with the impact of air pollution requires international co-operation within appropriate regional groupings drawing on advanced scientific understanding and involving the development of cost effective burden sharing strategies.
We should make a concerted effort to make the environment free from pollution and help realise the set goal.
