Airports & Pollution

Airports and Pollution

Abstract

How do airports affect the environment and the area surrounding an airport? Transportation through the air is an ever-growing portion of the way people get to their destinations these days. But how many people know about the forms of pollution that occur at an airport. Noise pollution, water pollution, and air pollution are some of the effects at airports and the area around them that are occurring today.

Airports and Pollution

The many effects of the ever-growing aspect of airports and the rapidly demanding growth of transportation through the air may be spoiling the environment that we live in today. The most noted form of pollution that occurs from airports and the planes that fly in and out of them everyday would be noise pollution. To express sound we often refer to the word decibel. Decibel is a shorthand way to express the amplitude of sound. Prolonged exposure over 85 decibels that could occur at any point of your daily routine could signal the beginning of hearing loss. Just to give you a few examples of the decibel values of some common everyday activities, at the clothing department of a large store you could experience 53 decibels. Normal everyday conversation with someone sitting next to you exposes you to 60 decibels. Heavy city traffic exposes you to 92 decibels. A jet liner traveling 500 feet overhead from you exposes you to 115 decibels. That's 30 decibels over the point where hearing could be damaged if there is a prolonged exposure.

Water pollution at airports is another major concern for us as citizens. Water pollution affects more people that just the ones located near an airport. 45 of the 50 busiest airports in America today are located within three miles of a major waterway according to the National Resources Defense Council. The major pollutant, a substance called ethylene glycol or propylene glycol, is one of the major substances that are getting into our waterways. Glycol is used for de-icing the airplanes during the winter weather season. At 93 airports during the 1989-1991 timeframe, more than four million gallons of glycol was used for de-icing purposes. With well over 500 certified airports in the United States, the actual amount emitted is much higher than reported. During de-icing, the airlines mix 55 percent glycol with 45 percent water, heat the mixture to 185 degrees Fahrenheit, and spray the planes down with the mixture. Without any recapture efforts or recycling efforts, 50 to 80 percent of the glycols may end up in the waterways. While other chemicals that are used to airports may get into the waterways, glycols receive the most attention. Ethylene glycol is both more effective and more toxic than propylene glycol. The lethal dose for humans of ethylene glycol is a little over three ounces, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Any amount less than three ounces can cause damage to the kidneys. Propylene glycol is relatively safe and innocuous, but no figures are available as to the percentage of airports using the ethylene or propylene glycol. However, both glycols consume high levels of oxygen during decomposition. This can delete waterways of oxygen and cause a massive kill of the fish and other creatures that inhabit the waters. The Natural Resources Defense Council complains that the regulations for disposal of de-icing chemicals lack any enforcement codes. The storm water pollution prevention plan required of all states under the Clean Water Act says that airports should greatly reduce contaminated storm water discharge from airports if implemented as required. But the council complains that it's not clear when or if the plans will be inspected by a regulatory agency. Only airports that use an average of 100,000 gallons or more of de-icing fluid will be required to monitor or sample that storm water discharge that the airport may discharge. This number is frightening because, the airports that use 100,000 gallons or more of de-icing fluid accounts for only four to ten percent of all of the airports throughout the United States. At Maryland's Baltimore/Washington International Airport, an estimated 25 percent of glycols are collected during de-icing operations. This doesn't mean that the other 75 percent reach our waterways, but just that some of the amount that is not collected either evaporates or is transferred into the ground where it decomposes in anywhere from four to twenty days. Other ways that the airport contains glycols is that it uses two de-icing pads near the end of the runways to retrieve the chemical. They also use "glycol recovery vehicles", that are basically a big street sweeper or vacuum that recover the glycol and any other liquid on the pavement that could also contain glycol.

Airports are among the greatest sources of local air pollution. A major airport's idling and taxing airplanes can emit hundreds of tons of pollutants into the air surrounding the local area. In 1993, commercial aircraft emitted more than 350 million pounds of VOCs and NOx during the takeoff and landing cycles. This is more than double the rate that was from the levels during the 1970's according to National Resources Defense Council. VOCs and NOx are two classes of pollutants that are major precursors to ground-level ozone. It is assumed that on the East Coast alone during the summer months that between ten to twenty percent of all hospital admissions for respiratory problems may be ozone related. VOCs are also known as volatile organic compounds. They are found in most products that we use everyday. They have been found in paints and coatings to underarm deodorant and cleaning fluids. VOCs are a major concern of the Environmental Protection Agency and state air quality boards all over the United States. Ozone has been a difficult pollutant to control because it isn't emitted into the atmosphere, but actually formed there through a photochemical process. In this process VOCs play a significant role. They interact with oxides of nitrogen and sunlight to form ozone. NOx is commonly referred to as a mixture of nitric oxide (NO) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2). Although through evidence collected proves that NOx is harmful to humans, it is considered an environmental problem because it initiates a reaction that results in the production of ozone and acid rain.

It is argued that ground access vehicles such as passenger cars