Hydrogen Sulfide In The Salton Sea

Oceans cover approximately 75% of Earth 's surface and are vital to this planet and the people who inhabit it. Oceans provide food, natural resources, and recreation for nearly everyone in this world. Unfortunately Oceans have been receiving mass amount of pollutants including oil spills, toxic waste dumping, and industrial dumping. These pollutants will have negative impacts on the wildlife in the ocean, as we are seeing already with the Coral Reefs, and soon enough it will begin to affect our lives as well.

World War Two resulted in a chaotic destruction that overwhelmed Europe. These feelings of dismay are concisely summarized in Ruta Sepetys’ Salt of the Sea.. An impactful quote states, “war had bled color from everything, leaving nothing but a storm of gray.” The war in 1945 had drained any and all feelings of hope and spirit out of European people. In it’s wake, the war left a cloud of devastation and despair. Florian and Joana have to overcome this war, their fate, and guilt in order to return to their past selves and survive their journey in a German and Russian warzone.

Although Salt to the Sea is a story about things that have been lost and people enduring extreme hardships, it is also a story about hope, family and love. In the book Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys, almost all of the main characters go through extremely tragic and terrible events. However, these characters also experience family moments and happy times. Despite the fact that in times of war there is hardship, violence and death, love and family shines through the tragedy. It is the two youngest members of the group, Klaus and Emilia, who eventually find a family to love.

(Salton Sea Symposium, 1998) However , the condition of the Sea has drastically changed and so has the amount of healthy living organisms in the Sea. By the 1980�s the water level rose greatly and gave way to abandoned businesses, deteriorating structures and empty beaches. The above was due to the fact that evaporation is the only outlet to the Salton Sea , in fact 1.35 million acre feet of water is lost each year , thus increasing its salinity even more. The salinity of the Salton Sea has increased to 45,000 parts per thousand or 45 PPT; the Pacific Ocean is currently 35 PPT.

Many historical fiction novels recall well-known tragedies, but there is one novel in particular that tells the story of a covered catastrophe. Salt to the Sea, by Ruta Sepetys focuses on telling the unknown story of “the greatest maritime disaster in history,” the sinking of a German ship, the Wilhelm Gustoff, during World War II. Throughout telling the story, Sepetys portrays the theme of perseverance, as the characters face many challenges, but never give up. Despite the growing popularity of this novel, Sepetys did not gain her reputation from Salt to the Sea. Rather, she became the author she is today from her previously published novels, Between Shades of Grey and Out of the Easy. Septeys was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan, but she is part Lithuanian. Growing up in the United States allowed Septeys the ability to attend Hillsdale College, where she received a bachelor’s degree in international finance. Like many others, I learned of Septeys’ work through her other novels. I have read both Between Shades of Grey and Out of the Easy, and thoroughly enjoyed them. Because I enjoyed her other works in a great deal, Salt to the Sea immediately made my “to-read” list. For this project, I knew I wanted to read a novel I would enjoy, and Salt to the Sea was sure to not disappoint.

Impact can be felt on many fronts. For the migratory birds that rely on the lake and the fish from the lake, if the said lake worsens, the ecological impact will be dramatic and devastating. Economically, the farms that relied on the water from the area either went out of business or still continued to get their water from the Colorado River. The resorts and businesses that were bustling before abandoned the area too, losing their businesses and a way of have a wage. There was also the heavy health impact on the people who live around the Salton Sea area, with the particulate dust having leftover residue of pesticides and hydrogen sulfide being tossed into the air and wept out to farther reaches of the region (Than, 2014) (Gottberg and Cichocki

The first major problem is the Salton Sea is a salt lake with salinity levels 25% higher than our oceans according to a study conducted by the California Department of fish and Game (Cohen). The salinity levels are gradually rising due to the fact the sea has no outlet and water is only lost through evaporation, leaving dissolved salts behind. In addition, sitting at an elevation of 220

Every year, hundreds and thousands of civilians used to vacation in a place that is now left in the dust. This specific place, not so common anymore is the Salton sea, located directly on the San Andres fault. The Salton sea is a shallow, saline, endorheic rift lake inside California's Imperial Valley and Coachella Valley. However, surrounding this site is extreme poverty and alarming rates of respiratory problems, while on the outside of this valley, face deep controversies with government spending and scientific concerns. Many of these situations have severe, possibly deadly consequences, which is why many have devoted themselves to working on various aspects of the injustice. Furthermore, this region has brought upon many profound disputes

The ocean is a very delicate ecosystem in which the slightest change of pH or chemical composition will result in devastating results. Between 25 and 40% of anthropogenic carbon emissions have entered the marine area since the industrial age (Sabine et

In the modern industrial era, the levels of Carbon Dioxide produced are much more significant than in years before. Due to Carbon Dioxides involvement in ocean acidification, this is a major issue. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, the pH of the ocean surface has fallen by 0.1 units. Although this may not seem significant, due to the logarithmic properties of the pH scale, this change signifies about a 30% increase in ocean acidity. If this issue isn’t addressed, there will be dire consequences for both marine organisms, as well as humans. To understand ocean acidification, some chemistry needs to be defined and understood.

Sometimes called “climate change’s equivalently destructive twin”, ocean acidification is becoming more and more noticeable as the seawater’s changing chemistry begins to cause environmental and economical problems. When the Industrial Revolution began around 1760, fossil fuel–powered machines gained an immense amount of accessibility and popularity. Since then, carbon dioxide (CO2) levels in the atmosphere have risen enough to change the pH of the world’s oceans. Given that the ocean absorbs almost half of the CO2 that is released into our atmosphere, ocean acidification is inclining into an even greater problem as fossil fuels become a more common energy source in our society. Higher acid levels can harm wildlife, disrupt the food chain, and negatively impact industries that rely on the ocean for business. Ocean acidification is causing growing dilemmas for both marine ecosystems and ocean-based economies. Although many companies and organizations are attempting to fix this problem, acidification is still threatening to cause increasingly harmful issues for the future.

Ocean pollution is one of the most urgent issues in our world today. The ocean is crucial to our ecosystem and it is being severely damaged at an alarmingly increasing rate. In this paper I will educate about the role the ocean plays in our beautiful Earth, why it is being so widely ignored and dismissed, the causes of pollution, and its effects on animals and humans alike.

The world we live in is so vast and exciting. Seventy percent of our world is liquid water we call the ocean. In the ocean there are many creatures that each are unique in their own way. However, it is possible that in our lifetime, many marine organisms will become endangered or possibly extinct. The loss of these mejestic marine creatures will be caused mainly because of human advancements in which fossil fuels are used to produce energy. Biodiversity is greatly affected by this increase in acidity. As the ocean acidifies, multiple social and economic issues arise. As humans, we rely on the ocean for almost everything. Much of our food, clothing, cleaning products and cosmetics come from the ocean. With the loss of

Although the ocean covers approximately two thirds of the Earth’s surface, it is surprisingly susceptible to human influences. The effects of rubbish dumping have tainted our oceans and they have taken their toll on the vast marine environments and the populations in which they contain. Rubbish dumping involves depositing all the waste materials from factories and industries, tankers and ships and sewerage waste materials into the oceans and seas. In the report “Causes and Effects of Ocean Dumping”, the author Sharda states that “The wastes that are dumped into the oceans tend to have toxic substances which soak in all the oceanic oxygen. This

“Although ocean water tastes like water with table salt (sodium chloride) dissolved in it, it is a lot more complex than that” (Friese 33). Pure sea water contains a vast amount of dissolved chemicals. It contains everything from sodium chloride to trace amounts of silver and gold. Although the inhabitants of a marine reef aquarium are not going to be effected if the water does not contain gold, they will not live long if all that is added is table salt (Friese 33). Marine salt mixes contain a similar collection of elements that are found in natural seawater.