What role do we as a whole and as individuals play in water pollution?

Question

This is for my sociology class and also, if you can, can you cite your resources?

Answer 1

We play a huge role both as a society and as individuals.

If you eat meat you probably unwittingly add to the problem in a big way.  Especially with pork.  The waste from super farms goes into these things I like to call p**p lagoons which are these acre huge ponds that pour all the p**p, after birth, fertilizer, even dead hogs.  Chicken and cow farms aren't much better.  Then they spray this nasty p**p lagoon stuff onto the fields and then it runs off into local water supplies.  Also when the lagoons flood they contaminate the water supplies.

Check out this resource in rolling stone http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/sto...

Ok then there is just general agricultural run off from pesticides that we use if you don't buy and use organic.  But that isn't all we put all these turf builders and fertilizers on our lawns in an attempt to have the greenest lawn and kill those dandelions and that runs off too (maybe even worse than farms becuase there are no regulations on home owners).

http://www.grounds-mag.com/mag/grounds_m...

Then there is pollution from oil and improper disposal of batteries and paint leaky septic systems and no septic systems.  Then we flush stuff down our house drains that shouldn't be there.   It is terrible.  

http://www.baltimorecountymd.gov/Agencie...

People are concerned about having enough water and they waste it watering their lawns and taking 30 mintue showers.  They refuse to use recycled sewer water that sometimes registers higher than other water.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/11/27/a...

Answer 2

The main sources of water pollution are:

Agricultural runoff. Farm chemicals leech into the soil. This then runs into coastal waters and deoygenates the breeding grounds of fisheries. Pretty severe problem worldwide.

http://www.lenntech.com/eutrophication-w...

Human waste. Partially, and occasionally untreated sewage  enters the biosphere. Leads to toxification of drinking and bathing water.

http://www.cpcb.nic.in/oldwebsite/sewage...

highway runoff & gas/oil pollution: the careless disposal of automobile fluids, and the really huge problem of leaky gas station underground containers.

There is an enormous amount of literature on this. Here's something for starters:

http://www.mlive.com/environment/index.s...

Plastics, fast food packaging, discarded 'white' waste puts many toxic chemicals in the water supply. The kinds of toxins from this can be very pervasive and hard to clean out of th ecosphere. They include arnsenic, dioxin and other deadly compounds.

http://jeq.scijournals.org/cgi/pdf_extra...

Bio waste (from hospitals) nuke waste (from spent fuel to badly handled ancillary waste) often gets quietly dumped in rivers and the ocean to cut corners in medical and nuclear industries.

This is a massive problem and rather than one site, which you may disbelieve, simply google the following phrase.

careless handling of nuclear wastes

...and take some time to read the articles.

I hope that helps.