1.) Our group chose to do plastic recycling.
2.) Using our bio bottles for support, our action project will be to promote plastic recycling and to show its importance. We want to help others become aware of the effects not recycling their plastics can have on our environment. Plastics take an extremely long time to compose and instead often end up in our water table so not only do they effect the growing of plants they also pollute our water. We want to show people that when plastic is littered it harms our environment severely.
3.) In our bio bottle we will be testing numbers 1 and 2 plastic and the effect they have on the growing of our grass and peas. We have 1 bottle that will be our constant and the other 2 bottles each have 10 pieces of plastic laying on top of the soil. We will compare the growth of our plants in the bottles with the plastic to our constant bottle and hopefully there is a significant difference between the plants so we can show others how harmful plastic truly is and how important recycling our plastics are to our environment.
4.) You assigned us temperature for our river test which I'm not really sure how that relates to plastic recycling but I do know that if plastic is not recycled it often ends up in our river which severely impacts our water table because it often causes the death of animals because they tend to mistake the plastic debris for food and then their bodies can't digest it so they die. Even worse when the animal eats it and dies, then its body decompose, the plastic does not and it remains in the water to be digested again and kill more animals. (www.buzzle.com)
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Eaton Rapids Water Treatment Blog
In the city of Eaton Rapids the water is filtered by going through these three huge blue holding tanks that have rocks and charcoal inside that clean all the debris out of the water. They backwash the tanks twice a week in order to get all the debris that the rocks catch out of the tanks. They clean the water by addding in clorine and another liquid that kills all the bacteria that could be in the water.
Our trip yesterday was really fun. I learned quite a bit about our city water that I never knew before. I didn't even kow where our towns water treatment plant was before yesterday. We learned that there is aroun 1,000,000 gallons of water in the two towers that are in our town, under water there is thousands more gallons. We also learned that there is 34 gallons of pipes throughout our town that our water travels through. If the power went out in our town there would still be water pressure in the city because they have a huge back-up generator and if that fails as well there is another generator that runs off chemical reaction or somehti like that so no matter what our city will always have good water pressure.
They also took us into the lab yesterday and told us a little about how they do lab testigs on the water in our school and at the hospital. They are required to take 6 samples of water throughout our town but they take more just to be sure there is no problems at all in the water system. They take the samples from our school and the hospital, places that there are alot of people drinking the water. They put the samples in a test container and then add some chemicals and put it in an incubator to see if there is any bacteria or anything bad in it. Laslty they told us about the part of their job that they don't like. They exlained that when there is a water main break they have to go repair it, even in the middle of the winter when its freezing outside.
Our trip yesterday was really fun. I learned quite a bit about our city water that I never knew before. I didn't even kow where our towns water treatment plant was before yesterday. We learned that there is aroun 1,000,000 gallons of water in the two towers that are in our town, under water there is thousands more gallons. We also learned that there is 34 gallons of pipes throughout our town that our water travels through. If the power went out in our town there would still be water pressure in the city because they have a huge back-up generator and if that fails as well there is another generator that runs off chemical reaction or somehti like that so no matter what our city will always have good water pressure.
They also took us into the lab yesterday and told us a little about how they do lab testigs on the water in our school and at the hospital. They are required to take 6 samples of water throughout our town but they take more just to be sure there is no problems at all in the water system. They take the samples from our school and the hospital, places that there are alot of people drinking the water. They put the samples in a test container and then add some chemicals and put it in an incubator to see if there is any bacteria or anything bad in it. Laslty they told us about the part of their job that they don't like. They exlained that when there is a water main break they have to go repair it, even in the middle of the winter when its freezing outside.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Water Treatment Blog
1.) The processes below are commonly used in water purification plants. Some may not be used depending on the scale of the plant and quality of the water.
1.Pumping and containment - The majority of water must be pumped from its source or directed into pipes or holding tanks. To avoid adding contaminants to the water, this physical infrastructure must be made from appropriate materials and constructed so that accidental contamination does not occur.
2.Screening - The first step in purifying surface water is to remove large debris such as sticks, leaves, trash and other large particles which may interfere with subsequent purification steps. Most deep groundwater does not need screening before other purification steps.
3.Storage - Water from rivers may also be stored in bankside reservoirs for periods between a few days and many months to allow natural biological purification to take place. This is especially important if treatment is by slow sand filters. Storage reservoirs also provide a buffer against short periods of drought or to allow water supply to be maintained during transitory pollution incidents in the source river.
4.Pre-conditioning - Water rich in hardness salts is treated with soda-ash (sodium carbonate) to precipitate calcium carbonate out utilising the common-ion effect.
5.Pre-chlorination - In many plants the incoming water was chlorinated to minimise the growth of fouling organisms on the pipe-work and tanks. Because of the potential adverse quality effects, this has largely been discontinued.
Widely varied techniques are available to remove the fine solids, micro-organisms and some dissolved inorganic and organic materials. The choice of method will depend on the quality of the water being treated, the cost of the treatment process and the quality standards expected of the processed water.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_purification#Treatment
2.) Sewage can be treated close to where it is created (in septic tanks, biofilters or aerobic treatment systems), or collected and transported via a network of pipes and pump stations to a municipal treatment plant. Sewage collection and treatment is typically subject to local, state and federal regulations and standards. Industrial sources of wastewater often require specialized treatment processes.
Conventional sewage treatment may involve three stages, called primary, secondary and tertiary treatment.
Primary treatment consists of temporarily holding the sewage in a quiescent basin where heavy solids can settle to the bottom while oil, grease and lighter solids float to the surface. The settled and floating materials are removed and the remaining liquid may be discharged or subjected to secondary treatment.
Secondary treatment removes dissolved and suspended biological matter. Secondary treatment is typically performed by indigenous, water-borne micro-organisms in a managed habitat. Secondary treatment may require a separation process to remove the micro-organisms from the treated water prior to discharge or tertiary treatment.
Tertiary treatment is sometimes defined as anything more than primary and secondary treatment. Treated water is sometimes disinfected chemically or physically (for example, by lagoons and microfiltration) prior to discharge into a stream, river, bay, lagoon or wetland, or it can be used for the irrigation of a golf course, green way or park. If it is sufficiently clean, it can also be used for groundwater recharge or agricultural purposes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sewage_treatment#Process_overview
3.) What is a micron rating?
How often do we have to clean out septic tanks?
1.Pumping and containment - The majority of water must be pumped from its source or directed into pipes or holding tanks. To avoid adding contaminants to the water, this physical infrastructure must be made from appropriate materials and constructed so that accidental contamination does not occur.
2.Screening - The first step in purifying surface water is to remove large debris such as sticks, leaves, trash and other large particles which may interfere with subsequent purification steps. Most deep groundwater does not need screening before other purification steps.
3.Storage - Water from rivers may also be stored in bankside reservoirs for periods between a few days and many months to allow natural biological purification to take place. This is especially important if treatment is by slow sand filters. Storage reservoirs also provide a buffer against short periods of drought or to allow water supply to be maintained during transitory pollution incidents in the source river.
4.Pre-conditioning - Water rich in hardness salts is treated with soda-ash (sodium carbonate) to precipitate calcium carbonate out utilising the common-ion effect.
5.Pre-chlorination - In many plants the incoming water was chlorinated to minimise the growth of fouling organisms on the pipe-work and tanks. Because of the potential adverse quality effects, this has largely been discontinued.
Widely varied techniques are available to remove the fine solids, micro-organisms and some dissolved inorganic and organic materials. The choice of method will depend on the quality of the water being treated, the cost of the treatment process and the quality standards expected of the processed water.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_purification#Treatment
2.) Sewage can be treated close to where it is created (in septic tanks, biofilters or aerobic treatment systems), or collected and transported via a network of pipes and pump stations to a municipal treatment plant. Sewage collection and treatment is typically subject to local, state and federal regulations and standards. Industrial sources of wastewater often require specialized treatment processes.
Conventional sewage treatment may involve three stages, called primary, secondary and tertiary treatment.
Primary treatment consists of temporarily holding the sewage in a quiescent basin where heavy solids can settle to the bottom while oil, grease and lighter solids float to the surface. The settled and floating materials are removed and the remaining liquid may be discharged or subjected to secondary treatment.
Secondary treatment removes dissolved and suspended biological matter. Secondary treatment is typically performed by indigenous, water-borne micro-organisms in a managed habitat. Secondary treatment may require a separation process to remove the micro-organisms from the treated water prior to discharge or tertiary treatment.
Tertiary treatment is sometimes defined as anything more than primary and secondary treatment. Treated water is sometimes disinfected chemically or physically (for example, by lagoons and microfiltration) prior to discharge into a stream, river, bay, lagoon or wetland, or it can be used for the irrigation of a golf course, green way or park. If it is sufficiently clean, it can also be used for groundwater recharge or agricultural purposes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sewage_treatment#Process_overview
3.) What is a micron rating?
How often do we have to clean out septic tanks?
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Footprint Blog
1. www.recyclemaster.blogspot.com
2. Im not really sure how to use a blog at all but i think if i learned how it would be helpful.
This website might be confusing for younger kids.
3. My fotprint is 27 tons of CO2 per year of estimated emissions
4.
a.) I can reduce my emmisions myself by turning off my lghts when there not in use, take a shorter shower, and unplug things when not in use.
b.) My school can recycle paper and water bottles, use energy efficient lights, and share paper.
c.) My community can carpool more, recycle more often, and pick up trash.
5. If our community can recycle better and try to keep our river cleaner in our town it will help keep our water-shed cleaner and nicer. If our community worker together we would pick up trash and carpool more often we could keep our river and air cleaner by emmiting less pollution.
2. Im not really sure how to use a blog at all but i think if i learned how it would be helpful.
This website might be confusing for younger kids.
3. My fotprint is 27 tons of CO2 per year of estimated emissions
4.
a.) I can reduce my emmisions myself by turning off my lghts when there not in use, take a shorter shower, and unplug things when not in use.
b.) My school can recycle paper and water bottles, use energy efficient lights, and share paper.
c.) My community can carpool more, recycle more often, and pick up trash.
5. If our community can recycle better and try to keep our river cleaner in our town it will help keep our water-shed cleaner and nicer. If our community worker together we would pick up trash and carpool more often we could keep our river and air cleaner by emmiting less pollution.
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