With the movement of so many people from the countryside to the cities, urban pollution has increased exponentially over the past half a century. Reason for this is liked to many factors relating to industrialization and difficult to address. This essay will discuss some of these causes and offer some suggestions as to how their effects can be minimized.
Obviously, the greatest contributors to urban pollution are traffic and industry. Emissions from the exhaust fumes of all kinds of vehicles contain carbon dioxide which contributes to global warming. These exhaust fumes also contain particles, particularly in older vehicles, that can lead to many health problems such as asthma and skin allergies. Industry also produces these fumes and particles which can cause the unhealthy smog that surrounds so many cities and is infamous in places such as Hong Kong and Los Angeles.
The only practical long-term solution to traffic and industry emissions is better, cleaner ways of producing power, and in the short term, limiting the number of vehicles. It is the burning of fossil fuels that causes so much pollution, so increasing the availability of hybrid or electric cars and using some biofuels in industrial power plants would cut down emissions. The number of automobiles allowed on the road at one time can also be limited. This is already done in some countries such as Santiago, Chile where only cars with certain license plate numbers are allowed on the roads each day
In conclusion, traffic and industry are two of the major causes of pollution in urban areas; however, the problem is not impossible to solve. With sufficient political will and public support, alternative sources of power could be developed to such and extent that they would help reduce the effect of urban pollution.