- Email: [email protected]
Air quality in selected urban areas 1975–1976
Environment International
Vol. 2, pp. 201-202 Pergamon Press Ltd. 1979. Printed in Great Britain
Book Reviews J. Tourbier and R.W. Pierson, Jr. (1976) Biological Control of Water Pollution. University of Pennsylvania Press Inc. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
designs. It should serve as a good introduction to the area of controlled ecosystem disposal and treatment of waste and waste waters.
Biological Control of Water Pollution
Gary S. Sayler Department of Microbiology and The Graduate Program in Ecology The University of Tennessee Knoxville, TN 37916, U.S.A.
was derived from the proceedings of the International Conference on Biological Water Quality Improvement Alternatives, hosted by the Center for Ecological Research in Planning and Design and the Department of Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning, the University of Pennsylvania. The conference brought together politicians, administrators, engineers and biologists from the United States and a dozen foreign countries in an effort to promote discussion and design of alternative biological methods for the processing of water and waste water. The book is divided into six major sections dealing with the rationale and significance, limnology, health effects, biological treatment, aquifer recharge and implementation of alternative methods of biological treatment of waste waters. The initial section dealing with the rational of alternate methods, recognizes the significance and effectiveness of ecosystem disposal of waste waters and problems associated with recalcitrance of environmental toxicants in contemporary waste water treatment system. A historical and political overview pin points specific problems of socio-economic resistence to environmental sanitation, recalcitrant contaminants, and environmental health hazards. The three chapter section dealing with the limnological overview of aquatic ecosystems is adequate. A great deal of attention is paid to descriptive aspects of microbially mediated nutrient cycling and macrophyte distribution in various aquatic systems. Yet, this section is too general to allow the reader to focus in on some specific problems associated with nutrient enrichment, and toxicant effects or transport in aquatic ecosystems. The sections dealing with biological treatment and ground water recharge are very informative. A variety of aquatic and wetland plant communities are described in relation to waste water biological treatment alternatives. These chapters deal primarily with nutrient removal and comparative efficiencies with conventional waste treatment, cost effectiveness, biomass production, food sources and, to a limited extent, pathogen elimination and environmental toxicant removal. Multiuse biological treatment systems for animal feed production, shellfish culture, resource reclamation and energy production are also described. Legal, economic, social and cultural barriers, and incentives with respect to implementation of alternative biological treatment system are discussed in the final section of this volume. It is acknowledged that no one system will find universal acceptance or applicability for waste water processing or water quality management. Furthermore, it is recognized that world-wide integration of alternative biological control measures with conventional waste treatment technology may be a long-term process unless the needs, applicability and effectiveness ~f alternative biological treatment strategies are adequately demonstrated. Current investigators in the field will, most likely, find this work ~eneral and somewhat outdated with respect to recent developments in the area alternative biological treatment methodology. The critical problem of environmental toxicants and recalcitrat molecules in waste waters and their accommodation by controlled ecosystems is only weakly addressed in discussion on the biological treatment processes. In addition, literature citations are brief and some of the reports have surfaced in more recent scientific literature. However, this book does a good job of integrating many of the problem areas associated with biological methods and their implementation in waste treatment 201
World Health Organization (1978). "Health implications of nuclear power production." Report on a Working Group, Brussels, 1-5 December 1975. Copenhagen, WHO Regional Office for Europe. WHO Regional Publications European Series No. 3: ISBN: 92 9020 103 7.75 pp. S. Fr. 8. US$ 4. Because the general public is frequently apprehensive about the safety of nuclear installations, and in order to provide health authorities with sound, unbiased information for use in management and decision making, the WHO Regional Office for Europe organized a Working Group to study, discuss, and appraise the effects on man and the environment of nuclear power production. This meeting was attended by experts in health administration, health physics, human biology, environmental science and technology, and nuclear engineering from 12 European countries and the United States of America, together with representatives of various intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. The discussions focused mainly on the risks to man from low-level radiation as well as on the environmental aspects of the entire nuclear fuel cycle, and touched upon the likelihood and consequences of nuclear and non-nuclear accidents, sabotage of nuclear power plants, and thefts of fissionable material. The Working Group also examined measures designed to protect nuclear power workers and the general population. Other topics discussed included the handling, storage and disposal of radioactive waste, cost-benefit evaluation of nuclear power, human error and structural failure in the production of accidents, and radiobiological/epidemiological evidence for health injury. The comprehensive report on this Working Group contains a number of important recommendations regarding nuclear power generation and concludes with an extensive list of references, an annex giving some important definitions, and a list of the participants in the Working Group. This publication should prove useful both to health authorities and all those concerned with the development or production of nuclear power.
World Health Organization (1978). "Air quality in selected urban areas 1975-1976", published under the joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health Organization, Geneva, World Health Organization. (WHO Offset Publication
No.
41:
I S B N 92 4 170041 6,
42
pp.
S. Fr. 9. This volume, the second report to emerge from WHO's air quality monitoring project, presents data on sulfur dioxide and suspended particulate matter or smoke collected in some 125 stations that monitored urban air quality in 26 countries or areas in 1975-1976. .Data for 1973 and 1974 appeared in an earlier WHO publication
202 which also gives further information on the project's objectives, the selection of monitoring sites, and data processing procedures. The data are tabulated as cumulative frequency distributions for each sampling site, by city. Information on sampling site location, number of samples analysed, minimum and maximum concentrations, and arithmetic and geometric means is also shown. The analytical method used and the averaging period are indicated at the top of each table. Measurement methods are summarized in an introductory section. Details of the WHO collaborating centres and national centres that reported data in 1975-1976 appear in an annex. A second annex presents a report on an inter-laboratory quality control study carried out in 1975 to compare the results obtained in sulfur dioxide analyses. The study, in which 10 laboratories took part, was restricted to an evaluation of analytical accuracy; sampling competence was not tested. Air pollution remains a crucial problem in most large cities today. The continuity of the data reported, coupled with the project's steadily increasing scope, suggest that this new volume, like its predecessor, will prove a valuable tool both to public health and other national and municipal authorities and to planners wishing to study pollution levels and trends. W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n (1978). " E n v i r o n m e n t a l H e a l t h C r i t e r i a 6: P r i n c i p l e s a n d m e t h o d s f o r e v a l u a t i n g t h e t o x i c i t y o f C h e m i c a l s . " P a r t 1. P u b l i s h e d u n d e r t h e joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health Organization, Geneva, World Health Organization, 1978 I S B N 92 4 1 5 4 0 6 6 4. 2 7 2 p p . U S $ 1 5 . 4 0 . S. F r 28. The sixth publication in the series on Environmental Health Criteria is concerned with the principles of toxicity testing and the procedures involved. More than 50 experts from some I l countries and the staff of a number of WHO Collaborating Centres cooperated with the World Health Organization in the preparation of this work. The work has been divided into two separate publications. The first part now under review contains the broad principles and more general aspects of toxicity testing; the second part (in preparation) will systematically cover some more specialized procedures for safety evaluation and will consider factors that may modify the outcome of toxicity testing and evaluation. Individual chapters in the first part deal with general aspects of toxicity evaluation, including definitions, dose-effect and dose-response relationships, interpretation of laboratory data, ethical considerations, and establishment of environmental health standards; factors influencing the design of toxicity studies; the principles and design of tests for acute, subacute and chronic toxicity; chemobiokinetics and metabolism; morphological studies; inhalation exposure; and carcinogenicity and mutagenicity tests and their significance. Each chapter is followed by an extensive list of references, amounting in total to about 800 citations. The general approach has been to present the underlying scientific principles, to evaluate the utility, strengths and weaknesses of various methods and procedures, in order to help the reader to select the most suitable technique for a specific purpose, though not prescribing standard tests. The work, compiled in close collaboration with the International Agency for Research on Cancer, is published under the joint
Book Reviews sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and WHO. The publication will be of interest to toxicologists, oncologists, pathologists, occupational and public health workers, departments of the environment and of health protection, and national regulatory agencies. A French language edition is in preparation.
W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n (1978). " P h o t o c h e m i c a l o x i d a n t s " , E n v i r o n m e n t a l H e a l t h C r i t e r i a 7, P u b l i s h e d under the joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health O r g a n i z a t i o n , G e n e v a , W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n , 111 p p . S F r . 10. The seventh volume of the series on Environmental Health Criteria deals with the possible health risks of photochemical oxidants. The volume is based primarily on original publications and reviews, references to which are contained in the 320-item bibliography. Following a summary of the major issues and recommendations for further research, the book reviews the chemical and physical properties of the oxidants and the methods of their analyses; their sources in nature and elsewhere; and their environmental levels and exposure of the population. The effects of these photochemical oxidants are considered in both animals and man and the work concludes with an evaluation of the health risks to man of exposure to these substances. The volume is based on reviews received from national institutions collaborating with the WHO Environmental Health Criteria Programme and on comments obtained from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Meteorological Organization and the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and was finalized by a group of experts under the auspices of WHO. The publications will be of interest to departments of the environment and of health protection, to national regulatory agencies, public health workers and meteorologists. Denis Hayes (1979), Pollution: The Neglected Dimensions, Worldwatch Paper No. 27, 31 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Kathleen Newland (1979), Global Employment and Economic Justice: The Policy Challenge, Worldwatch Paper No. 28, 47 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Lester R. Brown (1979), Resource Trends and Population Policy: A Time for Reassessment, Worldwatch Paper No. 29, 55 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Erik Eckholm (1979), Planting for the Future: Forestry for Human Needs, Worldwatch Paper No. 26, 64 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Denis Hayes (1978) Repairs, Reuse, Recycling - - First Steps Toward a Sustainable Society. Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. 45 pages. US$2.00 Lester R. Brown (1978 The Worldwide Loss of Cropland Worldwatch Intstitute, Washington, D.C. 48 pages, US$2.00.
Vol. 2, pp. 201-202 Pergamon Press Ltd. 1979. Printed in Great Britain
Book Reviews J. Tourbier and R.W. Pierson, Jr. (1976) Biological Control of Water Pollution. University of Pennsylvania Press Inc. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
designs. It should serve as a good introduction to the area of controlled ecosystem disposal and treatment of waste and waste waters.
Biological Control of Water Pollution
Gary S. Sayler Department of Microbiology and The Graduate Program in Ecology The University of Tennessee Knoxville, TN 37916, U.S.A.
was derived from the proceedings of the International Conference on Biological Water Quality Improvement Alternatives, hosted by the Center for Ecological Research in Planning and Design and the Department of Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning, the University of Pennsylvania. The conference brought together politicians, administrators, engineers and biologists from the United States and a dozen foreign countries in an effort to promote discussion and design of alternative biological methods for the processing of water and waste water. The book is divided into six major sections dealing with the rationale and significance, limnology, health effects, biological treatment, aquifer recharge and implementation of alternative methods of biological treatment of waste waters. The initial section dealing with the rational of alternate methods, recognizes the significance and effectiveness of ecosystem disposal of waste waters and problems associated with recalcitrance of environmental toxicants in contemporary waste water treatment system. A historical and political overview pin points specific problems of socio-economic resistence to environmental sanitation, recalcitrant contaminants, and environmental health hazards. The three chapter section dealing with the limnological overview of aquatic ecosystems is adequate. A great deal of attention is paid to descriptive aspects of microbially mediated nutrient cycling and macrophyte distribution in various aquatic systems. Yet, this section is too general to allow the reader to focus in on some specific problems associated with nutrient enrichment, and toxicant effects or transport in aquatic ecosystems. The sections dealing with biological treatment and ground water recharge are very informative. A variety of aquatic and wetland plant communities are described in relation to waste water biological treatment alternatives. These chapters deal primarily with nutrient removal and comparative efficiencies with conventional waste treatment, cost effectiveness, biomass production, food sources and, to a limited extent, pathogen elimination and environmental toxicant removal. Multiuse biological treatment systems for animal feed production, shellfish culture, resource reclamation and energy production are also described. Legal, economic, social and cultural barriers, and incentives with respect to implementation of alternative biological treatment system are discussed in the final section of this volume. It is acknowledged that no one system will find universal acceptance or applicability for waste water processing or water quality management. Furthermore, it is recognized that world-wide integration of alternative biological control measures with conventional waste treatment technology may be a long-term process unless the needs, applicability and effectiveness ~f alternative biological treatment strategies are adequately demonstrated. Current investigators in the field will, most likely, find this work ~eneral and somewhat outdated with respect to recent developments in the area alternative biological treatment methodology. The critical problem of environmental toxicants and recalcitrat molecules in waste waters and their accommodation by controlled ecosystems is only weakly addressed in discussion on the biological treatment processes. In addition, literature citations are brief and some of the reports have surfaced in more recent scientific literature. However, this book does a good job of integrating many of the problem areas associated with biological methods and their implementation in waste treatment 201
World Health Organization (1978). "Health implications of nuclear power production." Report on a Working Group, Brussels, 1-5 December 1975. Copenhagen, WHO Regional Office for Europe. WHO Regional Publications European Series No. 3: ISBN: 92 9020 103 7.75 pp. S. Fr. 8. US$ 4. Because the general public is frequently apprehensive about the safety of nuclear installations, and in order to provide health authorities with sound, unbiased information for use in management and decision making, the WHO Regional Office for Europe organized a Working Group to study, discuss, and appraise the effects on man and the environment of nuclear power production. This meeting was attended by experts in health administration, health physics, human biology, environmental science and technology, and nuclear engineering from 12 European countries and the United States of America, together with representatives of various intergovernmental and nongovernmental organizations. The discussions focused mainly on the risks to man from low-level radiation as well as on the environmental aspects of the entire nuclear fuel cycle, and touched upon the likelihood and consequences of nuclear and non-nuclear accidents, sabotage of nuclear power plants, and thefts of fissionable material. The Working Group also examined measures designed to protect nuclear power workers and the general population. Other topics discussed included the handling, storage and disposal of radioactive waste, cost-benefit evaluation of nuclear power, human error and structural failure in the production of accidents, and radiobiological/epidemiological evidence for health injury. The comprehensive report on this Working Group contains a number of important recommendations regarding nuclear power generation and concludes with an extensive list of references, an annex giving some important definitions, and a list of the participants in the Working Group. This publication should prove useful both to health authorities and all those concerned with the development or production of nuclear power.
World Health Organization (1978). "Air quality in selected urban areas 1975-1976", published under the joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health Organization, Geneva, World Health Organization. (WHO Offset Publication
No.
41:
I S B N 92 4 170041 6,
42
pp.
S. Fr. 9. This volume, the second report to emerge from WHO's air quality monitoring project, presents data on sulfur dioxide and suspended particulate matter or smoke collected in some 125 stations that monitored urban air quality in 26 countries or areas in 1975-1976. .Data for 1973 and 1974 appeared in an earlier WHO publication
202 which also gives further information on the project's objectives, the selection of monitoring sites, and data processing procedures. The data are tabulated as cumulative frequency distributions for each sampling site, by city. Information on sampling site location, number of samples analysed, minimum and maximum concentrations, and arithmetic and geometric means is also shown. The analytical method used and the averaging period are indicated at the top of each table. Measurement methods are summarized in an introductory section. Details of the WHO collaborating centres and national centres that reported data in 1975-1976 appear in an annex. A second annex presents a report on an inter-laboratory quality control study carried out in 1975 to compare the results obtained in sulfur dioxide analyses. The study, in which 10 laboratories took part, was restricted to an evaluation of analytical accuracy; sampling competence was not tested. Air pollution remains a crucial problem in most large cities today. The continuity of the data reported, coupled with the project's steadily increasing scope, suggest that this new volume, like its predecessor, will prove a valuable tool both to public health and other national and municipal authorities and to planners wishing to study pollution levels and trends. W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n (1978). " E n v i r o n m e n t a l H e a l t h C r i t e r i a 6: P r i n c i p l e s a n d m e t h o d s f o r e v a l u a t i n g t h e t o x i c i t y o f C h e m i c a l s . " P a r t 1. P u b l i s h e d u n d e r t h e joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health Organization, Geneva, World Health Organization, 1978 I S B N 92 4 1 5 4 0 6 6 4. 2 7 2 p p . U S $ 1 5 . 4 0 . S. F r 28. The sixth publication in the series on Environmental Health Criteria is concerned with the principles of toxicity testing and the procedures involved. More than 50 experts from some I l countries and the staff of a number of WHO Collaborating Centres cooperated with the World Health Organization in the preparation of this work. The work has been divided into two separate publications. The first part now under review contains the broad principles and more general aspects of toxicity testing; the second part (in preparation) will systematically cover some more specialized procedures for safety evaluation and will consider factors that may modify the outcome of toxicity testing and evaluation. Individual chapters in the first part deal with general aspects of toxicity evaluation, including definitions, dose-effect and dose-response relationships, interpretation of laboratory data, ethical considerations, and establishment of environmental health standards; factors influencing the design of toxicity studies; the principles and design of tests for acute, subacute and chronic toxicity; chemobiokinetics and metabolism; morphological studies; inhalation exposure; and carcinogenicity and mutagenicity tests and their significance. Each chapter is followed by an extensive list of references, amounting in total to about 800 citations. The general approach has been to present the underlying scientific principles, to evaluate the utility, strengths and weaknesses of various methods and procedures, in order to help the reader to select the most suitable technique for a specific purpose, though not prescribing standard tests. The work, compiled in close collaboration with the International Agency for Research on Cancer, is published under the joint
Book Reviews sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and WHO. The publication will be of interest to toxicologists, oncologists, pathologists, occupational and public health workers, departments of the environment and of health protection, and national regulatory agencies. A French language edition is in preparation.
W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n (1978). " P h o t o c h e m i c a l o x i d a n t s " , E n v i r o n m e n t a l H e a l t h C r i t e r i a 7, P u b l i s h e d under the joint sponsorship of the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Health O r g a n i z a t i o n , G e n e v a , W o r l d H e a l t h O r g a n i z a t i o n , 111 p p . S F r . 10. The seventh volume of the series on Environmental Health Criteria deals with the possible health risks of photochemical oxidants. The volume is based primarily on original publications and reviews, references to which are contained in the 320-item bibliography. Following a summary of the major issues and recommendations for further research, the book reviews the chemical and physical properties of the oxidants and the methods of their analyses; their sources in nature and elsewhere; and their environmental levels and exposure of the population. The effects of these photochemical oxidants are considered in both animals and man and the work concludes with an evaluation of the health risks to man of exposure to these substances. The volume is based on reviews received from national institutions collaborating with the WHO Environmental Health Criteria Programme and on comments obtained from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Meteorological Organization and the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, and was finalized by a group of experts under the auspices of WHO. The publications will be of interest to departments of the environment and of health protection, to national regulatory agencies, public health workers and meteorologists. Denis Hayes (1979), Pollution: The Neglected Dimensions, Worldwatch Paper No. 27, 31 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Kathleen Newland (1979), Global Employment and Economic Justice: The Policy Challenge, Worldwatch Paper No. 28, 47 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Lester R. Brown (1979), Resource Trends and Population Policy: A Time for Reassessment, Worldwatch Paper No. 29, 55 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Erik Eckholm (1979), Planting for the Future: Forestry for Human Needs, Worldwatch Paper No. 26, 64 pages, Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. Denis Hayes (1978) Repairs, Reuse, Recycling - - First Steps Toward a Sustainable Society. Worldwatch Institute, Washington, D.C. 45 pages. US$2.00 Lester R. Brown (1978 The Worldwide Loss of Cropland Worldwatch Intstitute, Washington, D.C. 48 pages, US$2.00.