Point versus Non-PointSource Pollution

Essential Question:How do humans affect the quality of water with point and non-point sources of water pollution in North Carolina?

Pollutants

  • A pollutant is a substance or energy, like heat, that can cause harm to the environment and the organisms in it.
  • Water pollutants have a negative effect on the water system or living things that depend on the water.

Point versus Non-PointSource Pollution

  • Sources of pollution in water are identified by how they enter the water system.
  • A pipe gushing orange water or a tanker oil spill into a river would be from a single source, which is called a point source.

  • Sometimes it is hard to locate the source of pollution.
  • Runoff from a farm field, or street is a widespread source of pollution called non-point source pollution.

Contamination Plumes
  • An underground area where pollutants have been spread by groundwater is called a contamination plume.
  • These plumes can also be from point or non-point sources.

  • Picture of site in Minnesota after underground oil pipeline break.
  • The NC Triad has many oil pipelines running across it underground. What would happen if one of them broke?

Activity:

  1. Cut out each source of pollution.
  2. Glue the Category Heading “Point Source” to the left and “Non-PointSource” to the right on the top of a piece of paper.
  3. Cut out each of the other types of pollution and sort them into one of the categories.
  4. Glue them down after the class checks the answers.

Damaged wastewater pipe

/ Acid rain
Leaking underground storage tank / dish water release from homes
soil and silt from farms / Fertilizer runoff from golf courses
Waste runoff from hog farms / heated water release from Duke Power Plant into Belews Creek
Point Source Pollution / salts from irrigation of farms
release of chemicals from paper mill / Non-PointSource Pollution
Raw sewage release from
wastewater treatment plants

Do water Lab 17 pp A-105 to A- 108.

1. Students do the lab 17 on page A-105 of our book. Student groups of four divide into pairs. Table one does Part one: Point source contamination and the second table does Part Two: Non-point source contamination.

2. Student pairs do the experiment and write down observations.

3. Tables 1 and 2 share the results of both parts of the experiment.

4. Draw the results of both parts of the experiment.

Answers:

Point Source Pollution

Damaged wastewater pipe

Raw sewage release from

wastewater treatment plants

release of chemicals from paper mill

dish water release from homes

heated water release from Duke Power Plant into Belews Creek

Leaking underground storage tank

Non-PointSource Pollution

Waste runoff from hog farms

Fertilizer runoff from golf courses

soil and silt from farms

salts from irrigation of farms

Acid rain