By Dr. Ranil Senanayake

‘When you cannot take a breath, nothing else matters’ – American Lung Association

The most important thing in our lives that we forget is the air that we breathe. The air or atmosphere is part of the great global commons that every living being depends on. What is it?

Air is 78 percent nitrogen, 21 percent oxygen, 0.93 percent argon and 0.04 percent carbon dioxide. Although oxygen is the third most abundant element in the universe, free molecular oxygen (O2) is one of the rarest things in the entire universe. The only place known to have an atmosphere with O2 is planet Earth.

An exercise: Close your eyes, take a deep breath and know that your breath was made possible by a plant, somewhere at some point in time on this planet. Take a minute to be thankful for your easy breath. On average, a human needs about 750 kg of oxygen per year. All of humanity consumes about 7 billion tonnes per year.

The free oxygen in the atmosphere is 1.2×1015 tonnes (12,000,000,000,000,000 t), but it is unstable in our planet’s atmosphere and must be constantly replenished by photosynthesis in green plants. Without plants, our atmosphere would contain almost no O2. An important thing that needs international address is the fact that the system that replenishes the oxygen of our atmosphere is under threat. We remove the vegetation that produces oxygen at a prodigious rate. According to Global Forest Watch, we fell about 15 billion trees each year. With one tree producing about 120 kg of oxygen per year, the loss of oxygen production is massive. The impact on the oceans is becoming just as serious.

Oxygen is not only consumed by transport and steel production, it is also used to improve the thermal efficiency of fuel. Oxygen is used to treat polluted water and hazardous wastes and for the gasification process of coal. The gas can also replace chlorine in the pulp and paper industry in order to reduce pollution. Oxygen also finds large applications in the medical industry. The unaccounted uses from rocketry and the military have begun to eat into the replenishment rate of oxygen into the global commons at a prodigious rate.

Currently, at 20 percent, any drop in the local oxygen concentration can be disastrous, below 19.5 percent it can have adverse physiological effects and in atmospheres with less than 18 percent oxygen, it is life-threatening. While the concentration in the global commons is still acceptable, many large cities today are recording a drop in the local oxygen concentration with a rise in urban pollution.

As human activities have caused an irreversible decline of atmospheric O2 and there is no sign of abatement, it is time to take action to promote O2 production and pay for industrial use and consumption of O2. Vehicular traffic in cities with poor airflow design transforms molecular oxygen O2 into Ozone (O3). Ozone is good when it is high up in our atmosphere. It protects us from sunburn. Ozone is bad when it is close to the ground where we can breathe it in. You can’t see Ozone in the air but bad Ozone levels are sometimes called smog. It forms when chemicals coming out of cars and factories are cooked by the hot sun.

Breathing in Ozone can make you cough. It can also make it harder for you to breathe. Ozone might even make it hurt to take a breath of air. When you breathe in Ozone, it makes the lining of your airways red and swollen, like your skin would get with sunburn.

Unfortunately, adding to the problems of mining the global commons of air for its oxygen, there is also the issue of unchecked pollution. Air pollution has become a very serious and very visible burden on humanity. The WHO estimated that it was responsible for three million premature deaths worldwide per year in 2012; much of this mortality is due to exposure to small particulate matter of 2.5 to 10 microns in diameter (PM10) which causes cardiovascular and respiratory disease, and cancers.

Air pollution adversely impacts even healthy people; the effects include respiratory irritation or breathing difficulties during exercise or outdoor activities. The current health status and the pollutant type and concentration, or and the length of exposure to polluted air, determines the rate of cardiovascular and respiratory disease, and cancers. High air pollution levels can cause immediate health problems.

The air in Colombo is already of poor quality. PM10 has an annual average of 36 µg/m3 (micrograms per cubic meter). That’s 3.6 times the safe level set by the WHO. While the well-being of the citizens of Colombo seems the least important to the planners of our future, we need to inform ourselves on the cost we have to pay, so that we could defend ourselves from the consequences of ill-informed decision making.

The current air pollution level in all of Sri Lanka has an annual average of 22 µg/m3 of PM2.5 particles which is 2.2 times the WHO safe level. It has also been estimated that 7,792 people died from air pollution-related diseases and that the rate is increasing each year. The top illness caused by air pollution is Ischemic heart disease. Further, 33 children die of air pollution-related diseases every year. Currently, the main source of ambient air pollution in Sri Lanka is vehicular emissions, which in Colombo contributes to over 60 percent of total emissions. But, lurking in the activities of the proposed Port City and Megapolis, there is a huge hidden danger. The danger that uncontrolled construction debris will pose to air quality and to the health of the residents of Colombo city as well as creating a barrier to oceanic breeze that keep the air in Colombo reasonably clean.

As the skyline around Colombo will be increasingly blocked by current unplanned construction, the through-flow of air will be reduced. We can already feel the effect when we breathe at midday in Colombo.

Construction activities that contribute massively to air pollution, include landfilling, operation of diesel engines, demolition, burning and working with toxic materials. All construction sites generate high levels of dust (typically from concrete, cement, wood, stone and silica) which can carry for large distances over a long period. Construction dust is classified as PM10 or particulate matter less than 10 microns in diameter, invisible to the naked eye.

Another emerging threat to the air quality of this nation is the possibility that the Hambantota area could be used to house oil and chemical industries. The history of such industries has been one of polluting, as much as any government will let them. The air quality of this nation must be seriously addressed in the legislature and strong controls placed on activities that affect the quality of air.

It has been noted that the combined effects of ambient (outdoor) and household air pollution cause about seven million premature deaths every year, largely as a result of increased mortality from stroke, heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer and acute respiratory infections. The pollutant load in the atmosphere needs to be strongly controlled as it interferes with our right to breathe.

Up till now there has been no serious attain paid to the quality of the air that we breathe. This raises a question: ‘If I and my ancestors enjoyed a certain quality of breath, is not the reduction of that quality an infringement of my established right?’

Next: Right to life – Right to toxin free food