THE 10 MOST POLLUTED PLACES IN THE WORLD

 

Travelling around the world is something that makes us know many beautiful places, like the Hawaii Islands, the Caribeans, California, or cities like Rome, London or Paris. These places  are really beautiful aren’t they? But the Earth has two sides. If we can see a lot of amazing places, we can also see very polluted ones, spread all over the world. Pollution has been caused by humans during the latest centuries, because of the industrial development.

Let’s see what the most polluted places in the world are.

CITARUM RIVER, INDONESIA

 

 Citarum river, in Indonesia, is full of waste, plastics and chemical substances. It is impossible to find life in it, fish died for what the inhabitants throw away in the river. This river crosses populous zones and it is dangerous because the contact with the water can cause  illnesses and infections.

CHERNOBYL, UKRAINE

 

In 1986   the biggest nuclear disaster in history took place there. The explosion of the fourth reactor released a great deal of dangerous radiations that caused terrible diseases. The radiations also killed every form of life. Nowadays, there are no animals or vegetables that can survive there.

KABWE, ZAMBIA

 

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, English colonized Zambia because they discovered lead deposits. Extracting lead, they didn’t care of the lead emissions  in the air.  Even if the mines are not active now, the concentration of lead in the air is ten times more than the permitted limits.

DZERZHINSK, RUSSIA

 

It’s been the site where Russian built the biggest chemical industries during the latest century. The level of dioxin in the air is a thousand times more than the limit. Humans live an average of 45 years. It’s terrible!

SUMGAIT, AZERBAIJAN

 

It was one of the most important petrol-chemical center of USSR. The industries deposited great quantities of toxic mercury waste, (about 120,000 tons). This caused diseases like tumors  or genetic defects.

LA OROYA, PERU’

 

This town is situated at 4,000 metres a.s.l. on the Andes, in Chile. The American company Doe Run, built a structure to extract copper and lead. The problem is that the industry released toxic waste in the environment and that is terrible; scientists said that in the kids, the level of lead is three times more than avarage.

NORILSK, RUSSIA

 

In Norilsk, there is one of the biggest industries for heavy metal fusion. Everyday, tons of sulphure dioxide is released in the air, which is now  so polluted that there is no life around the site. The first vegetables and plants grow up at a distance of 50 km from there. The land has become a desert.

VAPI, INDIA 

 

In the most industrialized zone in India, there are thousands of chemical industries. There aren’t laws to control the emissions of toxic substances so these industries release tons of chemical waste in the environment. The level of mercury is 96 times more than the level allowed by OMS.

SUKINDA, INDIA

 

Here there is the biggest open-air chromium mine in the world. The activity produces a lot of chemical substances that are useless for the industry, so the  waste is released in the river that crosses the city of Sukinda, where the population get lots of abortions, congenital diseases  and tumors.

YELLOW RIVER, CHINA

 

The Yellow river is not always yellow, but water can change its colour thanks to human irresponsibility.  Also here the industries release   chemical waste in this river, and its water can become red, green or light blue.

David P. , 5sc