Air, soil and water pollution in Hungary Comenius project 2012/2014 1.

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Air, soil and water pollution in Hungary

Comenius project 2012/2014

Environmental problems

• Rapid industrialization• Emissions from automobiles• Electric power • Acid rain• Sulfur dioxide in the air

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• The prevalence of chronic bronchitis symptoms among 9-10-year old Hungarian children was 17.3 %

• An assessment of the health effects of PM10 in Budapest and other cities, based on data from 2004, suggests that 170 premature deaths per 100 000 inhabitants per year can be attributed to long-term exposure to high PM concentrations.

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• Concentrations of SO2, CO, benzene and lead are below set limits throughout the country. Decreased emissions of sulphur dioxide over the past one to two decades resulted in a lower ambient air concentration of that pollutant

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• The concentration of pollen grains of 32 allergenic plant species and the spores of two fungus species, provides forecasts on expected short term concentrations during the nine-months long flowering season.

• River, lake, and groundwater pollution in Hungary are the result of industrial runoff, much of which is untreated when it enters the water.

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• Insufficiently treated sewage also contributes to water pollution, as a large percentage of the country’s population does not have access to adequate sanitation facilities. Hungary’s Lake Balaton, the largest lake in central Europe, is severely polluted. 6.

Sources of water pollution

• Dumping of industrial wastes, containing heavy metals, harmful chemicals, by-products, organic toxins and oils

• Chemical pollutants• Improper disposal of

human and animal wastes• The residue of agricultural

practices, including fertilizers and pesticides

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• A number of pollutants, both harmful and poisonous, enter the groundwater systems through rain water

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The biggest industrial accident

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• The Ajka alumina sludge spill was an industrial accident at a caustic waste reservior chain of the Ajkai Timföldgyár alumina plant in Ajka, Veszprém County, in western Hungary.

On 4 October 2010 the northwestern corner of the dam of reservoir no. 10 collapsed, freeing approximately one million cubic metres of liquid waste from red mud lakes. The mud was released as a 1–2 m wave, flooding several nearby localities, including the village of Kolontár and the town of Devecser. At least nine people died, and 122 people were injured. About 40 square kilometres of land were initially affected. The spill reached the Danube.

• The red mud involved in the accident is a waste product of the Bayer process, which refines bauxite into a form of aluminium oxide called alumina. The mud primarily contains non-aluminium compounds present in the bauxite ore and left as residues after its refining along with sodium hydroxide used to dissolve aluminium oxide. Iron(III) oxide, the compound from which the red color originates, is the main component

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• The wave of mud flooded streets in Kolontár, where seven people were confirmed dead, and Devecser, where the flow was powerful enough to ove cars and vans.

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• emergency workers were pouring tonnes of plaster into the waterway to try to bind the sludge and prevent it from continuing downstream

• The cleanup took a year and cost tens of millions of dollars.[

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• All waterlife died in the smaller Marcal River, first struck by the spill. There were also reports of sporadic fish death in the Raba and Mosoni-Danube rivers. There were no reports of major damage to the main branch of the Danube.

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Danube / Duna

• Large and small industrial plants in oil refining, chemicals, pulp, paper, coal, metallurgy and refining often release pollutants into the many ancillary rivers and tributaries that feed into the Danube River.

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• „We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children”