Showing results by author "Sivakumaran Sivaramanan" in All Categories

Plastic is a non- biodegradable organic polymer, which is very commonly used in materials, large amounts of discarded plastics accumulating in oceans as Garbage islands and in land as landfills or blocking streams and waterways. Leaching of waste plastics from land filling and fumes released during incineration resulting major health impacts to living things as well as polluting the air, water, and soil, burning PVC releases cancer causing dioxins and PCB. Addition to recycling waste plastics also used in production of energy or in co-processing. Oxo-degradable plastics end up in fragments ...

Sightings of garbage at open dumping, curbside wastes, beach trash and various litter, badly maintained or abandon buildings, curb graffiti, spray painted names and messages, hoardings, billboards, street banners, advertisement signs, electronic signs and public LED screens, telephone and utility poles, telephone, electricity and TV cables and wires, damaged vehicles and buildings, curbside weeds, aquatic weeds and eutrophic lakes, oil spills, curbside potholes, beggars, street children, smog/ haze and smoke could be an eyesore to the viewer, visual-clutter by dazzling billboards is common ...

According to NASA and IPCC, Global temperature has increased by 1.4 oF since 1880, CO2 levels has reached 400.71 parts per billion, loss of world’s forest cover between the period 2000 and 2012 is 1.5 million square km, reduction of land ice 287 billion metric ton per year, sea level rise is 3.2 mm per year and loss of arctic ice cover at the rate of 13.3% per decade. Increasing risk of irreversible changes due to large scale shift in the climate system such as several sensitive species of ocean corals, aquatic birds, reptiles such as sea turtles and amphibians are facing extinction, ...

Seven of top ten marine fisheries consist 30% of world’s fish catch are fully or over exploited, according to the report of Environmental justice foundation, each year about 10 million tons of bycatch are taken by shrimp trawlers, it is also estimated about 150, 000 sea turtles are killed annually by prawn trawlers, subsidies given by governments for the careful utilization of ocean resources has reached $15-30 billion every year. Marine Stewardship Council has certified 12 fisheries for sustainable management. This book reviews the causes of over exploitation of coastal and marine ...

Ocean acidification is the equally evil twin of climate change and it happens alongside of the global warming. Ocean acidification has lowered the pH of the ocean waters by about 0.11 units (SCOR 2009 as cited in ‘Tech Ocean Science’, n.d.). This is mainly due to anthropogenic CO2 emission, amount of CO2 on upper layer of the ocean has been increasing by 2 billion tons per year. Oceans have absorbed 1/3 of the CO2 produced by human activities since 1800 and fossil fuel burning alone account for half of the CO2 in the atmosphere (Sabine et al., 2004 as cited in ‘Tech Ocean Science’, ...

Restoration forestry or eco-forestry or sustainable forestry is basically not aimed to produce forest trees for logging or any sort of human consumption instead it mainly aiming the environmental protection in order to maintain Carbon dioxide and Oxygen levels as well as pacifying weather changes and the effects to the natural habitats. This book attempts to justify the reasons of deforestation, afforestation and reforestation with available examples and current techniques as per discussions of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and Land use, land use, change and forestry (LULUCF) of Kyoto ...

Animal abuse, cruelty and slaughtering are still in an increasing trend in this modern era. Unlike ancient times animals are killed not for food alone but also for various business needs. Crocodile, alligators and python slaughtered in a gruesome way for manufacture of Kelly bags for fashion industry, cattle are treated horribly even in dairy farms, whales and dolphins are killed for meat, fur seals are skinned alive, elephants and rhinos are hunt for their ivories, sharks are abandoned alive in deep waters after cutting their fins for soup, foxes, minks rabbits, cats and dogs are ...

Major sources of marine pollution are particles, hazardous chemicals, industrial, agricultural & residual wastes, warm water effluents, urban runoff and discharges, noise and invasive species. Plastics, oil or other organic wastes, PVC, plasticides, furans, dioxins, phenols, PCB and heavy metals are directly toxic to marine fauna while others block their alimentary canal or injuring the soft body parts such as eyes, gills or delicate eggs and young ones. Oil spills reduces the dissolving oxygen to water, affects plumage of birds and fur of mammals and associated with several malefic effects...

Acid rain is one of the major environmental threats since 19th century. This book reviews the 2012 progress report of US EPA (2013) and summarizes the issue in various environmental aspects. Significant reduction in the SO2, NOx emission and deposition of acid have been occurred via the active implementation of Clean Air Interstate Rule (CAIR), Acid Rain Program (ARP) and NOx budget training program (NBP). Cross state air pollution rule and litigation (CSAPR) implemented by US EPA since 2011 reduces the cross boundary movement of effluents between US and Canada. US national composite means ...

This part attempts to provide adequate evidences to explain that environmental problems are human origin and it argues more philosophically by providing the statements of the leading philosophers on the man’s state and responsibilities in the environment, it concludes in order to preserve the environment, changes to be done in social and behavior levels in the entire human system. Modified genes from engineered crop plants are escaping into weeds and other wild varieties. Today GE canola, corn and lesser extent soybean and cotton are contaminating their non-GE counterparts; this has ...

We live in a changing planet, and the problem we face also change time to time. This phenomenon is exactly same for anthropogenic environmental problems, for instance, to mitigate pest outbreak we introduced DDT, but that solution itself become a severe threat to the environment. DDT underwent bioaccumulation in living organisms and it also went through biomagnification and affect the top-level carnivore in the food chain including humans. Similarly, many man-made solutions to man-made environmental crisis become a new environmental problem. This chain of problems continues as a succession....

Each and every animal on earth has as much right to live as you and me. It is unacceptable to say that all human attempts to bring the captive closer to the wild have not been successful. However, it is unethical to redefine a species’ life as desired by humans or to satisfy human needs. Even a human offender is not allowed to spend his entire life in prison, so how can we do that to an innocent creature that never committed any harm according to its own ethics or righteousness? Those who argue that we keep them happy in captivity should think about what the same happened to them. Are ...

Air pollution is a global issue, it is a growing challenge since the time of industrialization and according to WHO ambient both urban and rural areas was estimated to cause 3.7 million premature deaths all over the world in 2012, in addition 3 billion people still depend on coal and biomass fuel (in door), annually there is several billion CO2 and other greenhouse gases are brought to atmosphere. Industries, power plants and transport are some major anthropogenic sources. In industries and other stationary sources there are various emission reduction techniques are being practiced such as ...

El Niño is the strongest change in the weather pattern of tropical Pacific region. It causes severe storms, floods, drought, forest fires, epidemics, famine, fish kill, bleaching of corals, and die back of forests. El Niño of 1997/98 (also called super El Niño) affected temperature and the rainfall in United States caused cyclones in eastern Canada and US region, floods in China, forest fires in Australia, epidemics such as Dengue outbreak thrived over western Pacific and Asia, over 35 countries declared federal disaster area. Crop loss, land degradation, river sedimentation and ...