Honors Chemistry Semester 1 Project

Explore the following environmental threats to life on earth: Climate Change

Climate change is a huge problem around the world and especially in polluted places like Hong Kong, they pose serious dangers including; higher temperatures, changing landscapes and destroying habitats of animals; this includes wildlife at risk, a few other problems are; rising sea, increased risk of drought, fire and floods, and stronger storms with stronger age. Climate is the average weather, temperature and amount of precipitation fallen in one certain region or country. So, climate change is the change of climates, this happens due to higher amount of carbon dioxide and other harmful gasses, including fossil fuels, the climate is rapidly changing throughout the world. The main places affected are places like the Antarctica, and the other poles, as it is heating up the nature, which means the ice is depleting and flooding the poles with water, (picture above).

Water Pollution

Once again, water pollution is a huge problem among many third world countries, and also Hong Kong because of the amount of pollution in the city. It poses serious dangers including; death of water animals, disruption of food chains, because of this destruction of ecosystems, and diseases, that affect humans. Water pollution is the contamination of water, including lakes, rivers, oceans, and groundwater, mostly caused by humans. Water pollution occurs when pollutants, particles, chemicals or substances contaminate the water by directly or indirectly make their way into the water, without enough treatment to clean the water and make it healthy enough to use it in our every day lives. Because of this, 40% Americas Rivers and 46% of Americas lakes are too polluted for fishing, swimming, or aquatic life. Every year, 250 million cases of water-based diseases and roughly 5 to 10 million deaths occur.

Toxins in Food & Soil

Toxins in both, food and soil has damaged people in our world tremendously. Toxins cause; a crazy amounts of diseases including; Cancer, impaired brain development, Parkinsons disease, miscarriages nerve damage, birth defects, heart disease, diabetes and many more. Toxins in food and soil, are caused by small molecules, or proteins that are capable of causing diseases on contact to your body, when they are transported into the soil or things you eat, they will go into your bodys system and can cause diseases quite soon after contact. As I mentioned earlier it can cause, easily fixed diseases or they could cause deadly ones that arent curable.

Depleting Ozone Layer

Depletion of the ozone layer has been a reoccurring problem for the last several years. The depletion of the ozone layer causes a larger amount of UV levels reaching the Earth from the sun, this causes non-melanoma skin cancer, and plays a major role in malignant melanoma development, and UV is also linked to cataracts. Ozone is a gas, and its chemical formula is; O3, Ozone depletion is simply wearing out the layer of ozone gas in the stratosphere. Ozone depletion is caused by something called CFCs, it is what factories and other plants produce, by making there item of distribution, after the CFCs have been released, sunlight breaks CFCs up, releasing chlorine, chlorine then reacts with O3, and destroys the ozone layer, more reactions occur which causes more depletion. Like I mentioned before the main problem with the depletion, is that there are more UV rays, which causes skin cancer and other types of diseases.

Air Pollution

(Hong Kong with and, without air pollution). Air pollution is a HUGE problem here in Hong Kong. The main effects of air pollution are as following; Acidification is when chemical reactions take place involving air pollutants, and they create acidic compounds, which cause harm to vegetation and buildings. If sulfuric acid is created it can mix with the clouds which can cause acid rain which destroys, trees and can harm animals, fish and other wildlife, a few other effects are; ground level ozone, where an ozone layer is created on the ground, and this can be poisonous to us, making it harder for us to breathe and can cause harm to wild life. Finally it can cause respiratory system failures, lung cancer and heart diseases. Air pollution occurs when gases, dust, fumes or odor are mixed into our atmosphere, the main pollutants are fossil fuels, carbon monoxide and finally sulfur dioxide.

Reaction Relating to Issue

1. Climate change: Combustion of Methane gas: CH (g) + 2O (g) --> CO (g) + 2H O (l)
4 2 2 2

Type of reaction: Combustion Oxidized: C in CH Reduced: O (g) # of e- transferred: 8 e4 2

Net Ionic Equation: CH (g) + 2O (g) --> CO (g) + 2H O (l)

4 2 2 2

Observations: Two clear gasses added together form a clear liquid and a clear gas. 2. Water Pollution H O (l) + SO (g) --> H SO (aq)
2 2 2 3

(Acid Rain) Type of Reaction: Synthesis Oxidized: none Reduced: none # e- transferred: none Net Ionic Equation: H O (l) + SO (g) --> H SO (aq)
2 2 2 3

Observation: Clear liquid and clear, pungent smelling gas added together, forming a clear liquid 3. Soil Pollution

4. Depleting Ozone Layer

Breaking down of the chloroflourocarbon to release the chlorine on its own, which destroys the ozone layer Cl CF (g) + UV Light --> ClCF + Cl (g)
2 2 2

The breaking apart of the ozone caused by the chlorine on its own Cl (g) + O (g) --> ClO (g) + O (g)
3 2

Type of reaction: Decomposition/Synthesis/single replacement Observation: Clear gas added to purple light amounts in two clear gases 5. Air Pollution O (g) + NO (g) --> NO
2

Type: Synthesis Oxidized: N in NO Reduced: O # e- transferred: 4 e2

Investigate Proposed Solutions to Solve these Environmental Threats: