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    Pollution Water Agriculture

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    Sikder Mohammod Ekteder Nabil
    This document discusses pollution of water from agricultural activities. Key pollutants include nutrients from fertilizers and manure, slurry, pesticides, milk effluents, silage effluents, heavy metals, and erosion. These pollutants can kill aquatic plants and fish. The document recommends reducing pollution by keeping agricultural animals away from watercourses, improving slurry and silage containers, not applying organic wastes within 10 meters of rivers, and better controlling pesticide use. Laws now regulate agricultural pollution and fine farmers for causing pollution.

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    Pollution Water Agriculture

    Uploaded by

    Sikder Mohammod Ekteder Nabil
    66 views20 pages
    This document discusses pollution of water from agricultural activities. Key pollutants include nutrients from fertilizers and manure, slurry, pesticides, milk effluents, silage effluents, heavy metals, and erosion. These pollutants can kill aquatic plants and fish. The document recommends reducing pollution by keeping agricultural animals away from watercourses, improving slurry and silage containers, not applying organic wastes within 10 meters of rivers, and better controlling pesticide use. Laws now regulate agricultural pollution and fine farmers for causing pollution.

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    Pollution_Water_Agriculture.ppt

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    This document discusses pollution of water from agricultural activities. Key pollutants include nutrients from fertilizers and manure, slurry, pesticides, milk effluents, silage effluents, heavy metals, and erosion. These pollutants can kill aquatic plants and fish. The document recommends reducing pollution by keeping agricultural animals away from watercourses, improving slurry and silage containers, not applying organic wastes within 10 meters of rivers, and better controlling pesticide use. Laws now regulate agricultural pollution and fine farmers for causing pollution.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as ppt, pdf, or txt
    66 views20 pages

    Pollution Water Agriculture

    Uploaded by

    Sikder Mohammod Ekteder Nabil
    This document discusses pollution of water from agricultural activities. Key pollutants include nutrients from fertilizers and manure, slurry, pesticides, milk effluents, silage effluents, heavy metals, and erosion. These pollutants can kill aquatic plants and fish. The document recommends reducing pollution by keeping agricultural animals away from watercourses, improving slurry and silage containers, not applying organic wastes within 10 meters of rivers, and better controlling pesticide use. Laws now regulate agricultural pollution and fine farmers for causing pollution.

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    You are on page 1of 20

    Pollution of Water by

    Agriculture
    • Vicki Chapman

    • Vanina Guevel

    • Anne Newson

    • Tony
    Situation
    • Before : organic waste as fertilizers
    • environment not a priority
    • Now : intensive agriculture
    • improved techniques
    • mineral fertilizers
    • pesticides
    • tests available
    How serious is the problem?
    What factors pollute water?

    • Nutrients • Silage effluents


    • Slurry • Animal carcasses
    • Pesticides • Heavy metals
    • Chemicals • Erosion
    • Milk effluents • Seeds
    Causes of all farm pollution
    incidents 1987-1991
    Nutrients

    • Main nutrients - nitrogen, phosphorus,


    potassium
    • Source - fertiliser, manure, rainfall, sewage,
    silage, etc.
    • EC Limit - rivers must not exceed the 50
    mg N /litre of water
    • Stimulate crop growth. A limit of 250 kg
    total N/year/ha is recommended from
    livestock manures

    •  The loss of the nutrients through soil


    percolation and land runoff, into the
    waterways causes disruption to the balance
    of the aquatic habitat.
    Slurry
    • Source – a mixture of
    animal dung and urine,
    Est. 200 million
    tonnes undiluted
    excreta produced
    annually in UK, 50%
    slurries.
    • Most slurry stored in
    earth bank lagoons
    estimated total
    volume is 15.5 million
    m3
    • Virtually all livestock waste is recycled to the
    land causing 17% of water pollution from
    agriculture to come from slurry.

    • There is a restriction of 10m 'no spreading'


    zone adjacent to all water courses, direct
    spillage is highly prosecuted.

    • Improvements in available grants have improved


    slurry stores, decreasing incidence from 99
    incidents in 1991 to 28 in 1996.
    Pesticides
    • Herbicides
    • Fungicides
    • Insecticides
    • Molluscicides
    • Rodenticides
    • Growth regulators
    • Sheep dips
    • … about 450 different
    products
    • Get into river by run-off into drains, leaching
    from soil, spray drift into watercourse, washings
    • High persistence and toxicity
    • Kill fish, amphibians, invertebrates and plants
    • Accumulation in lipids
    and sediments

    • Trace concentrations hard to measure


    • Long-term effects often unknown
    Milk and chemicals
    • Milking parlour
    washing effluents
    • Waste milk spread on
    the fields
    • Udder wash
    • 400x more polluting
    than untreated
    domestic sewage
    Silage effluent
    • Very harmful and
    concentrated pollutant
    • BOD level = 30,000 –
    80,000mg/l. Compare
    to 20-60mg/l for
    treated sewage.
    • Very corrosive. Hard
    to break down. Kills
    fish.
    Erosion
    • = the wearing away of
    the soil by wind/water
    • Soil clogs waterways
    • Excludes light from
    water
    • Aquatic plants die
    • No oxygen for fish
    and other aquatic life
    SUMMARY
    Summary
    Conclusion:
    How to reduce pollution
    • Agricultural animals should have no direct
    contact with running water courses.
    • Silage and slurry containers should be
    100% leak-proof.
    • Organic wastes, fertilisers, etc. should not
    be applied closer than 10m from the river
    (buffer strip) or 50m from wells or bore
    holes.
    • No intensive
    agriculture in “High
    risk areas” e.g. frozen
    ground, floodplain,
    etc.
    • Better use of
    pesticides
    • Plant new crops in
    stubble to reduce
    ploughing (see right)
    Laws controlling pollution
    • Water Act 1989 – Farmers can be fined up
    to £20,000 for causing pollution!
    • Environmental Protection Act 1990 – an
    integrated pollution control system for safe
    disposal of wastes.
    • Classification of pesticides –
    – Class I : forbidden (HCH, DDT, etc.)
    – Class II : to be reduced (PCSDs, etc.)
    Hope for the future

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