the earth also pollutes fury of mother nature man s contribution to environmental pollution are paltry compared to those of nature in her exceptional book trashing the planet former atomic energy commision chairman dr dixie lee ray notes based on the available data all of the air polluting materials produced by man since the beginning of the industrial revolution do not begin to equal the quantities of toxic materials aerosols and particulates spewed into the air from just three volcanoes krakatoa in indonesia in mount katmai in alaska in and hekla in iceland in to which could be added mount st helens in washington state in which pumped out metric tons of carbon dioxide alone el chicon in mexico in which sent more than million tons of sulfur gases into the stratosphere and mount pinatubo in the philippines which in hurled upwards of million tons of material into the stratosphere los ninos many environmentalists attributed the drought in the u s to global warming but researchers with the national center for atmospheric research in boulder colorado reported that the freakish weather was actually due to a natural phenomenon the interaction of el nino and el nina two massive currents in the tropical pacific el nino is a huge strip of warm water that periodically appears off the coast of south america and disrupts the world s weather patterns now and then it alternates with el nina a mass of cold water that comes from the ocean depths along the equator and drifts for thousands of miles chicago tribune s peter gorner summarized the phenomenon cold water along the equator clashed with warmer than normal water southeast of hawaii the result was both the u s drought and the devastating floods that swamped bangladesh nina s cooler water disrupted tropical weather patterns and distorted the path of the jet stream across north america then the jet stream shoved rain producing weather systems away from the interior of the u s resulting in drought termite terror sundry animals and insects also contribute their share to environmental degradation time for april noted that in the netherlands manure from pigs poses a major ecological threat defiling water supplies with excessive nitrites and acidifying local soils sheep have permanently scarred the landscape in spain and portugal while in india bovines cows are ravenous wraiths whose constant quest for food drives them to ravage standing forrests the february issue of science digest reported that an international team of researchers has discovered that termites generate more than twice the carbon dioxide that fuel burning does according to a study reported in science for november the estimated gross amount of carbon dioxide produced by termites was more than twice the net global input from fossil fuel combustion in addition termites are a potentially important source of atmospheric methane they could account for a large fraction of global emmisions the wood eating pests have a bacteria that enables them too digest carbon so efficiently that some pe is converted too carbon dioxide methane and other gases they belch into the atmosphere ants are another natural source of pollution in an atmospheric chemist with bell laboratories and zoologists from cornell university reported that ants of the subfamily formicinae make and store huge quantities of the formic acid that contributes most of the acidity of rain that falls in remote areas and is found in atmosphere gas and precepitation around the globe it is abundant for instance in the fog and mists that hang over the rain forests of central africa according to the july insight magazine the ants release the acid when defending themselves and communicating with each other and upon dying since percent of the world ant population belongs to this subfamily there is significant concern about the acid the ants release an amount estimated at metric tons annually which is equal to the combined formic acid contributions of automobiles refuse combustion and vegetation clearly man has a long way to go to match nature as a despoiler of the environment by robert w lee techie cellar org william a bacon the cellar bbs
