Effects of Pollution In A Natural Environment

People used to drop waste materials, including food wastes, where they had eaten it. In return, bacterial action decomposed this waste and returned the minerals into the soils. When population began to increase, more and more waste materials could be produced, either biodegradable or non-biodegradable.

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If this happen, there will be a great problem in waste disposal management.

Once people dumped their waste in vacant lots, grasslands, in the streams, rivers lakes or oceans.

People never realized how they destroyed the natural functions of these areas in relation to our environment. People destroyed the environment through pollution.

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Decomposition, or the return of materials to the nonliving environment is made by the decomposers, primarily the fungi, and bacteria.

In a natural environment, the decomposers are naturally abundant enough to bring the decomposition. In this manner man interfere the natural process in three ways.

First man introduced synthetic waste materials (non-biodegradable) which cannot be decomposed by bacteria and fungi such as plastic, man made fibers and other products.

Second by altering, either increasing or decreasing the amount of  certain substances in the environment. An example of this is an eutrophication, the decrease of the amount of the dissolve oxygen through excessive decomposition which is fatal to some aquatic organisms. Another example is the release of carbon dioxide which pollutes the air.

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The third is by dumping toxic garbage into our rivers and lakes which kills aquatic organisms.  This activity decrease the decomposer’s population which will lead to a lower cleansing power of a particular body of water.

Our environment is associated and working with its own system. The interference of man in this environmental system could lead to the destruction of the environment itself and brings danger to mankind.