Frequently Asked Questions –

1. What is water pollution?

Water pollution is any chemical, physical or biological change in the quality of water that has a harmful effect on any living thing that drinks or uses it.

2. How does water pollution affect you?

Water pollution affects you by making your drinking water dirty, killing the animals that live in your local environment, and destroying lakes and rivers in your towns.

3. How can we control water pollution?

We can control water pollution by turning off running water, by not putting flushing items other than poop down the toilet, by not overusing pesticides and fertilizers, using more environmentally friendly products, and not littering in bodies of water.

4. What are the costs of water pollution?

The affect water pollution has on the environment costs more than anyone can imagine.

5. How do you clean up a polluted body of water?

The first step to cleaning up polluted bodies of water is to stop polluting it, cleaning up trash in the water, and finally allowing it to regain its former prominence.

6. How does water pollution occur?

Water pollution occurs through too much sewage and waste, industrial waste dumping, oil pollution, atmospheric deposition, marine dumping, radioactive waste, and underground storage leakages.

7. What are some examples of the affects of water pollution?

Onondaga Lake in Syracuse, New York, is a prime example of water pollution, and its affect on a community.

8. What is eutrophication?

Eutrophication is when the nutrient levels in the body of water raise so much that there is a damaging amount of algae and that causes other negative effects on water life.

9. What is the difference between point source and non-point source pollution?

Point source pollution is when the pollutant is being poured or enters directly into the water while non-point source is pollutants entering indirectly, such as runoff from pesticides and fertilizers.

10. Why is algae such a bad thing?

Algae in moderate to low levels is not bad, however if there is too much algae it can absorb to much oxygen in the water or even block sunlight to other plants and animals.