Human-influenced sources may account for as much as 40% of the total NOx released into the atmosphere. The laughing gas, nitrous oxide (N2O), is approximately accountable to 7% of the greenhouse gases. The concentration of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere has significantly increased from the pre-industrial period as compared in the last two decades.

As a waste by-product of nitric acid production, oxides of nitrogen (NOx) are very harmful to the environment and they can also aggravate the effects of climate change. Emissions from nitric acid manufacturing plants may not be as significant as those of combustion of fossil fuels but a small difference in the levels of nitrogen oxides released into the atmosphere will mean a big difference since they are very harmful greenhouse gases.

Biofuels are also contributors to nitrous oxide. Contrary to popular belief, a report from the International Council for Science (ICSU) concludes that biofuel production can aggravate global warming rather than alleviating its effects. The theory is that annual plants and crops such as corn, wheat and sugar cane take up carbon dioxide during their growth. Hence, fuels burned from them have no significant carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere.

The same study also supported an earlier finding which determined that nitrous oxide has a more harmful effect on the environment and the climate change phenomenon than previously believed. The ability of nitrous oxide in warming up the planet is 300 times more than carbon dioxide. It also stays longer in the atmosphere.

Nitrous oxide is a natural occurring gas in the atmosphere as a result of the nitrogen cycle but it is the rate at which its concentration increases and the factors which contribute to this increase that worries scientists and environmentalists. One of the greatest factors which most of them have seen is the anthropogenic sources such as nitric acid manufacturing plants.

Greenhouse effects cannot be ignored anymore. Climate change is upon us. The weather has become even more unpredictable than before. Studies have also identified that the main cause of this phenomenon are unchecked and negligent human practices.

As a result of industrialization, comforts have been afforded to us, such as electricity, transport, and other luxuries we now enjoy. But this comes with a price, the warming up of the planet.

Is this really worth it? Can we really afford the unpredictability of the weather today, the increase in intensity of natural disasters? The world has certainly begun to experience the effects of the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by the higher than normal temperatures, the melting of the polar ice caps and the rising sea levels.

We have to make a move now. A move to reduce our impacts on the environment, this especially goes to those who are in the position to make a significant change in reducing nitric acid production by-products. Owners and managers of plants and companies which use nitric acid must have proper processing and disposal strategies which are environment friendly.

But the responsibility doesn’t stop there. We must do our part as well. We are also stakeholders therefore we have to take responsibility. One thing is for sure though, we have to start today. This is because of the fact that the planet will continue to warm up for no less than 150 years due residence time of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. It will take a long, long time before the climate becomes stable.

The Earth and Venus are near each other in the Solar System, and are similar in size, density, and composition. Based on our understanding of the origin of the Solar System, we would expect that their initial atmospheres would have been rather similar. Yet the present atmospheres of the two planets could hardly be much more different than they are. How did this come to be? The reason is thought to lie in what is termed the “Runaway Greenhouse Effect”.

Sunlight falling on the surface of a planet is primarily in the visible part of the spectrum. However, the reflection of light from the surface tends to produce light of longer wavelength called infrared (IR) radiation (also known as radiant heat; IR radiation is the heat that we sense being radiated from a hot surface like a hot piece of metal).

Now, because of their molecular structures, certain gases like carbon dioxide and water vapor (and many others) have the property that they are essentially transparent to visible light but absorb IR radiation very strongly. Such compounds are sometimes termed greenhouse gases because, if they are present in a planetary atmosphere, they absorb the scattered IR radiation and tend to raise the temperature of the atmosphere by trapping solar energy. (The analogy with a real greenhouse is imperfect because the mechanism by which a greenhouse stays warm is different, but it is sufficiently good that the name “(Planetary) Greenhouse Effect” is now the common one for this phenomenon.)

The greenhouse effect occurs for all planetary atmospheres containing greenhouse gases, and is responsible for their being warmer than would be the case otherwise. The greenhouse effect by itself could not account for the conditions that we find on Venus. However, under certain conditions we believe the greenhouse effect can “run away”. For example, consider the case of a planet like the Earth. The Earth has enormous amounts of two greenhouse gases: water vapor and carbon dioxide. However, for the Earth most of the water and carbon dioxide are not in the atmosphere. The water is mostly in the oceans, and the carbon dioxide is mostly bound chemically in rocks made from compounds that chemists call carbonates (for example, limestone).

Now suppose we increased the effectiveness of greenhouse heating of the Earth’s atmosphere, for example by increasing the amount of solar radiation falling on it, or by increasing the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere (for example, by burning fossil fuels, which produce water vapor and carbon dioxide as byproducts of burning). We would then expect the temperature to rise in the atmosphere (assuming no other effects intervened—a big “if” in the realistic case since the atmosphere is complicated). This would be a greenhouse effect.

It would become a runaway greenhouse effect if the rising temperature approached the boiling point of water, because then the oceans would begin to convert to water vapor, the water vapor would increase the effectiveness of heat trapping and accelerate the greenhouse effect, this would cause the temperature to rise further, thus causing the oceans to evaporate faster, etc., etc. (This type of runaway is also called a “positive feedback loop”.) When the oceans were gone the atmosphere would finally stabilize at a much higher temperature and at much higher density, because all the water would now be in the atmosphere.

We can envision even a further runaway stage in this scenario. Suppose the preceding runaway raised the temperature so high that chemical reactions begin to occur that drive the carbon dioxide from the rocks into the atmosphere (the process is called sublimation; a few hundred degrees Celsius would be sufficient). Then another runaway would occur as the carbon dioxide feeding into the atmosphere would accelerate the heating, which would in turn accelerate the transfer of carbon dioxide from the rocks to the atmosphere.

The atmosphere would finally stablilize at a still higher temperature and pressure after all the carbon dioxide had been driven from the rocks. In fact, we believe that if this sequence were to take place on the Earth, the resulting temperature and pressure of the atmosphere left behind would not be very different from that for present-day Venus: the atmospheric termperature would be hundreds of degrees Celsius and the pressure would be maybe 100 times greater than it is today.

Thus, we believe that in the case of Venus the initial solar heating kept oceans from forming, or kept them from staying around if they did form, and the subsequent lack of rainfall and failure of plant life to evolve kept the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rather than binding it in the rocks as is the case for the Earth; thus, Venus has an environmental disaster for an atmosphere.

The sobering warning for us is obvious: we have to be extremely concerned about processes such as burning of fossil fuels in large volumes that might (we don’t know for sure because the scientific questions are complex) have the potential to trigger a runaway greenhouse effect and produce on the Earth atmospheric conditions such as those found on Venus.

The main reason for deforestation is the demand for fuel, wood and paper products, cattle ranching, farming, mining and road construction. Half of all the trees cut down in the world are used for fuel. Burning wood is common in developing countries where there are often no readily-available alternatives. This in itself may not a huge problem; only, most of these trees are not replaced, which is a problem. The use of wood and paper, mainly in developed countries, is a huge factor driving deforestation all over the world. Hardwoods like mahogany are sought after for furniture and are consequently very valuable. In every square kilometer of rainforest, there are probably only half a dozen mahogany trees, yet the whole area is often cut down for those few trees, with other trees left to rot, even if they are useful for something. Areas of rainforest, generally in developing countries, are cleared by cutting down all the vegetation and then burning it. Pastures of grass are then grown and used for grazing cattle. As soon as the cattle are a certain age, they are slaughtered. Although some of the meat goes to the locals, a lot goes to the cheap meat industries giving products such as corned beef and burgers. Huge areas of rainforest have to be cleared to support several hundred cattle. After a few years, all the nutrients have been removed from the already poor soil and the land is useless, so another area of rainforest has to be cleared. Rejuvenation of the soil is possible, but it takes a lot of time and energy. Large areas of rainforest are cleared for farmland all over the world. In developing countries there are two main types of farming: ‘Slash and Burn’ and ‘Subsistence Farming’. In Slash and burn forming areas of forest are cleared to grow crops for a couple of years, and then left for a few years for the rainforest to recover, and then the process starts again. It is the most sustainable of the farming methods, but only if the population in the area is low, because as soon as you get more people in an area, there is less land available for each person and areas of land don’t have enough time to recover, so the soil is quickly exhausted. Slash and burn also increases air pollution. In Subsistence Farming, small areas of land that have been cleared are farmed. The produce is used to feed the family and provide a small surplus to buy other goods. The problem with this method is that the soil is quickly exhausted of its few nutrients and they are not replaced. This means that the farmers have to rely increasingly on fertilizers before eventually being forced to move. Rare minerals such as gold, bauxite and iron ore are often discovered in areas of rainforest. To mine them huge portions of rainforest are cleared, not just the area where the mine is, but also routes for roads and areas for storage of equipment and housing for men. Examples include gold-mining in the Amazon Basin and tin-mining in Indonesia. In places where there are large rivers running through rainforest, deforestation often takes place in order to build hydroelectric power stations. The resulting dams cause enormous amounts of flooding behind the walls and large areas of drought downriver. The world population is increasing. With this increase the amount of land needed for humans to live on also increases. More and more areas are being cleared to provide living space. This is known as urbanization. In developing countries people are moving into previously undisturbed areas of rainforest to log, mine or farm. For example, on the Indonesian island of Java, the population has grown so rapidly that people are encouraged to move to other less densely populated islands where they cut down the rainforest for farming and homes. Immediate effects of deforestation include the washing away of soil in the monsoon season. This is because trees are no longer anchoring and binding the soil and so mud slides take place. The earth is leached of minerals by the large amounts of water. The lack of vegetation also means that there will be very few animals in the area. The lack of decomposing vegetation and animals means that the nutrients are not replaced and the area quickly becomes infertile. Rivers often silt up as soil is moved downriver and deposition takes place. Fish and plants relying on clear water die as the river becomes more and more clogged. This has a knock-on effect through the entire food chain. If large areas of rainforest are cleared, the pattern of precipitation may change. This is because less evapotranspiration takes place due to the lack of trees. Water is also not delayed before making its way through the ground because of the lack of trees, shrubs, and leaf litter. Another very worrying effect of deforestation is global warming. The Earth is made habitable by a process called the greenhouse effect. Gases, mainly carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O) and water vapor (H2O), are found in the atmosphere. When light rays from the sun come into the Earth’s atmosphere, they are absorbed by the Earth, and then emitted as infra-red rays; the greenhouse gases trap some of them in the atmosphere, warming the earth. The greenhouse effect is essential for life to be able to live on earth because without it, it would be too cold. Current scientific theory suggests that when the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases, more of the heat rays are trapped in the atmosphere, gradually warming the Earth. This increase in temperature might seem quite nice, but it isn’t good. The effects of global warming are already showing themselves; the polar ice caps are melting and if this continues we are set for a significant rise in sea level, flooding many places. Places which are now full of life could become deserts if rainfall patterns change with the temperature increases. Deforestation may account for part of the rise of greenhouse gases because trees have a large store of carbon in them, they take in CO2 from the atmosphere through photosynthesis, and although a lot of what they absorb comes out through respiration, some of it stays in the tree in the form of carbon. When trees are cut down, and especially when they are burned, this carbon reacts with oxygen in the atmosphere and becomes CO2.Less trees mean more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and an increased greenhouse effect, which in turn means more global warming. Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are also rising because of the increasing burning of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are made from dead organisms, which have gradually been compressed over millions of years, so they contain a lot of carbon. This means that when they are burned carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere. This increased use of fossil fuels contributing to global warming led 160 nations to come together in 1997 in Kyoto, Japan, to try to reduce emissions. In 2001, the then newly elected president of the USA, George W Bush, declared that the USA would not sign the Kyoto Protocol because it would be economically damaging for the USA. Without the backing of those of the nations that have the highest emission levels in the world, however much all the other nations may try, there are remote chances reducing global warming, which, if not reduced, will have disastrous effects for all Many countries have a forestry management Commission, a governmental department that is set up to protect and increase the size of woodlands. For example, the forestry commission of U.K. and the National Forest Service of USA. Sustainable forestry is the act of managing a forest so that it continues to grow and the ecosystem is undisturbed. For every tree cut down, two more young ones are planted. Sustainable forestry is a good idea because even though trees are being cut down, if they are replaced, the amount of CO2 that can be absorbed and stored in the trees will stay roughly the same, thereby not contributing to the greenhouse effect. Land is set aside for trees with agreement from the owner and the local community that the region of land should be a woodland area. Grants are given to help with costs of planting etc. Pine trees are often planted as opposed to oak and other deciduous trees because they are fast-growing and there is a high demand for pine furniture and products.

Wind energy is a converted form of solar energy. The sun’s radiation heats different parts of the earth at different rates—most notably during the day and night, but also when different surfaces (for example, water and land) absorb or reflect at different rates. This in turn causes portions of the atmosphere to warm differently. Hot air rises, reducing the atmospheric pressure at the earth’s surface, and cooler air is drawn in to replace it. The result is wind.

Air has mass, and when it is in motion, it contains the energy of that motion — “kinetic energy.” Some portion of that energy can converted into other forms — mechanical force or electricity — that we can use to perform work.

How does wind energy work?

A wind energy system transforms the kinetic energy of the wind into mechanical or electrical energy that can be harnessed for practical use. Wind flows through turbines which create energy that can be used for electricity.

There are two basic designs of wind electric turbines: vertical-axis, or “egg-beater” style, and horizontal-axis (propeller-style) machines. Horizontal-axis wind turbines are most common today, constituting nearly all of the “utility-scale” (100 kilowatts, kW, capacity and larger) turbines in the global market.

The Future of Wind Energy

The U.S. wind energy industry turned in a solid performance in 2004, adding 389 megawatts (MW) of new generating equipment to the nationwide fleet, or enough to serve more than 100,000 average homes, according to AWEA.

How many homes can one megawatt of wind energy supply?

An average U.S. household uses about 10,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity each year. One megawatt of wind energy can generate between 2.4 million and 3 million kWh annually. Therefore, a megawatt of wind generates about as much electricity as 240 to 300 households use. It is important to note that since the wind does not blow all of the time, it cannot be the only power source for that many households without some form of storage system. The “number of homes served” is just a convenient way to translate a quantity of electricity into a familiar term that people can understand. (Typically, storage is not needed, because wind generators are only part of the power plants on a utility system, and other fuel sources are used when the wind is not blowing.)

How much energy can wind realistically supply to the U.S.?

Wind energy could supply about 20% of the nation’s electricity, according to Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratory, a federal research lab. Wind energy resources useful for generating electricity can be found in nearly every state.

U.S. wind resources are even greater, however. North Dakota alone is theoretically capable (if there were enough transmission capacity) of producing enough wind-generated power to meet more than one-third of U.S. electricity demand.

What is needed for wind to reach its full potential in the U.S.?

Consistent policy support

Over the past five years (1999-2003), the federal production tax credit has been extended twice, but each time Congress allowed the credit to expire before acting, and then only approved short durations. The PTC expired again December 31, 2003, and as of March 2004 had still not been renewed. These expiration-and-extension cycles inflict a high cost on the industry, cause large lay-offs, and hold up investments. Long-term, consistent policy support would help unleash the industry’s pent-up potential.

Nondiscriminatory access to transmission lines

Transmission line operators typically charge generators large penalty fees if they fail to deliver electricity when it is scheduled to be transmitted. The purpose of these penalty fees is to punish generators and deter them from using transmission scheduling as a “gaming” technique to gain advantage against competitors, and the fees are therefore not related to whether the system operator actually loses money as a result of the generator’s action. But because the wind is variable, wind plant owners cannot guarantee delivery of electricity for transmission at a scheduled time. Wind energy needs a new penalty system that recognizes the different nature of wind plants and allows them to compete on a fair basis.

New transmission lines

The entire transmission system of the wind-rich High Plains, which cover the central one-third of the U.S., needs to be extensively redesigned and redeveloped. At present, this system consists mostly of small distribution lines—instead, a series of new high-voltage transmission lines is needed to transmit electricity from wind plants to population centers. Such a redevelopment will be expensive, but it will also benefit consumers and national security, by making the electrical transmission system more reliable and by reducing shortages and price volatility of natural gas.

Transmission will be a key issue for the wind industry’s future development over the next two decades.