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| Тема |
 Европа произвежда 400 милиона тона на година |
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| Автор | Kalina (Нерегистриран) | |
| Публикувано | 22.04.04 06:56 |
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http://www.ecocouncil.dk/download/chemicals_maj00.pdf
Snippet
1 mill. tons in 1930 and 400 mill. tons today
The global consumption of industrially produced chemicals has skyrocketed over the past decades.
In 1930 the production of organic chemicals was approximately 1 million tons a year.
Today it is about 400 million tons a year (EEA and UNEP, 1998).
Europe is the largest producer of chemicals worldwide, accounting for about one third of the world's
production. On a global scale chemicals production was an important part of the rapid economic
development that took place in the '60s and '70s. Thousands of new materials and products were
invented and placed on the market without much testing of the potential harmful effects of all those
new chemical substances.
Hazardous chemicals are found in numerous every-day products
Today, it is clear that a large number of synthetic chemicals are known or suspected to be harmful
to our environment and our health. These chemicals are found in numerous everyday products, such
as detergents, paints and varnishes, furniture, carpets, toys, clothes, textiles, cosmetics, medicine,
pesticides, building materials, computers, televisions, food and food packaging etc. Harmful substances
can be released both during production, use and disposal of these products. The result is that
manmade chemicals are becoming ever-present in the environment - in air, water, food, soil, sediments
and living organisms.
Nonetheless, increasing amounts of hazardous chemicals are being produced and released each year.
Figure 1 shows that the hazardous chemicals' share of GDP has been rising in the period of 1990-1997.
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Abysmal ignorance
Data missing on more than 85 % of man-made chemicals
The effects of the man-made chemicals that surround us in our daily lives, are by and large unknown.
Most chemicals have never been assessed in terms of their harmful effects on health and
environment (see later). It has been estimated that for more than 85% of the 2,500 HPV chemicals
little or nothing is known (Allanou et. al., 1999) and it is likely that the situation for chemicals produced
in lower volumes is worse.
Only some 2,600 chemicals or groups of chemicals (about 4,800 single substances) have been
officially classified as dangerous in accordance with the safety regulations of the EU.
Of these, about 2,000 have been assessed according to their environmental impacts.
In addition, the producers have classified approximately 4,000 substances themselves; however
there is no external quality control of these self-classifications.
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