Chemistry is a required course for middle-school students, but some
experts are calling on the 258 middle schools in Harbin to be more
careful about draining off chemical wastewater created in
experiments, which they say is polluting the environment.
It
is a new problem in environmental protection, said a chemical
teacher for Harbin First Middle School whose surname is Xi when
interviewed with Harbin Daily. Some materials used in senior
middle-school students' organic experiments, such as phenol and
bromobenzene, are poisonous. Benzene is a known carcinogenic. Some
labs in middle schools have no means of direct disposal of
experimental wastes, and disposal machines are expensive.
A
chemical teacher in Harbin Sixth Middle School also thinks the
school can do nothing in regard to laboratory pollution. He said if
one class conducts chlorine experiments, the whole school fills
with the smell of chlorine. And the smell of sulfur dioxide is more
unpleasant. According to another teacher, although the school is a
key school, its laboratories have no recycling equipment for
wastewater that is poured into the sewer -- let alone what goes on
in ordinary schools
Middle-school students need to conduct many experiments, according
to teaching programs, and half of them involve acidic or alkaline
reactions that are poisonous. With dense acids and alkali, teachers
ordinarily pour them into specific containers for other experiments
or to wash containers. They pour the liquid into sewers after it
has become less poisonous. Some schools bury corrosive and
dangerous wastes. As gases are not easy to reclaim, some teachers
reduce their pollutions through acid-base neutralization. A few
schools are equipped with ventilation machines to pump out
poisonous gases, but this only transfers pollutants to other
places.
Fan Qingxin, professor for the Environmental Engineering School of
Harbin Institute of Technology and an expert in laboratory
environment protection, said school laboratories are contributing
much harm to the environment since many sewers link directly to
rivers in Harbin. Even if the chemical wastewater soaks into the
earth, the pollution to the environment is tremendous. Foreign
schools all have special recycling programs, which need funds but
are required. And delivering laboratory wastes to special places
for treatment is a basic social responsibility.
Fan advised middle schools to do harmless experiments to protect
environment. He added that schools should pay more attention to the
construction of laboratories and the training of lab assistants.
Environmental protection departments can also ask chemistry
departments to collect experiment wastes. In a word, he said,
creating pollution should not be a by-product of any study to
further knowledge.
(Yue Tongming for 新華網
[Xinhua News Agency] January 21, 2002 translated by Feng Yikun for
china.org.cn)