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It’s Not Easy Being Green—Green Chemistry (September 26, 2003, One)

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Program Summary

From dry cleaning solutions to paint fumes to papermaking by-products and pesticides, our environment is brimming with chemicals. With so many chemicals all around us, will our children’s grandchildren’s Earth be a chemical soup in the year 2500?

Maybe. But not all chemicals are bad. In fact, certain chemicals may just save the day. Green chemistry is an area of science that explores using environmentally friendly chemicals to clean up contamination. One such “green” agent, an oxidation catalyst called Fe-TAML, may be able to clean up a variety of toxic messes such as poisonous pesticides in soil and contaminated water.

What makes a chemical green? And how can use green chemicals to protect our world from becoming toxic?

Guests

Terry Collins, director, Institute for Green Oxidation Chemistry, and Thomas Lord Professor of Chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Related Links and Resources

Green Chemistry Links
The American Chemical Society
The Environmental Protection Association: Green Chemistry
Zero Waste Alliance

For Discussion:

• What is green chemistry?
• What is pollution?
• What are some of the ways in which toxins are released into the environment?
• Why should we care about toxic chemicals?
• What are some ways we can prepare the Earth for the children who will live on it in 2500?

Activities

Plop, fizz, bang. Need a few easy-to-do chemistry experiment ideas for your class? Head to Reeko’s Mad Scientist Lab. Erupting volcanoes, dancing raisins, homemade plastic, and the amazing melting properties of salt are a few of the simple experiments that explain simple chemistry and chemical reactions. There are science book reviews, science tips and more, all delivered in a highly irreverent style.

Comic relief. Separate the chemical facts from fiction at the University of Kentucky’s Department of Chemistry’s The Periodic Table of Comic Books.For some basic info and a fun way to hook students on chemicals and elements, enlist the help of some superheroes. Superman changes a piece of coal into a diamond in the carbon section while Wonder Woman is transformed into a proton and Donald Duck, the Silver Surfer, Iron Man, Tin Tin, Metamorpho, and the Avengers ward off evil-doings in content laced with chemicals. Chemicool’s Periodic Tableis a clickable table of the elements offering in-depth information about each element.

Kid power. So many activities give students a feeling of doom when it comes to pollution and ecology. Empower them with things they can do now to make a positive difference. The Global Warming Kids’ site from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) called We Can Make a Difference has a list of empowering things students can do to make a difference in the environment as well as explanations of global warming, the greenhouse effect, and the climate system. Hangman, crossword, and Q&A games reinforce global warming concepts.

Sniffing out toxins. For a step-by-step exploration of how to investigate your school environment for pollutants, check out the National Resource Defense Council’s Green Squad. You can print out progress report worksheets and get tips for how to make your school a greener place to be. Tour a house to learn about toxic household chemicals, poison prevention, and product safety at the EPA’s Learn About Chemicals in Your House. This site has quizzes, fun facts, puzzlers, and questions that could be easily adapted into a unit on toxins and the environment.

Suck it up. How can we dispose of the waste our civilization is creating? Make an Incredible Edible Chemical Landfill and help kids learn about disposing of waste. Layers of Jell-o, candy, and pudding represent the kinds of chemical wastes we have in America today. And while kids “treat” the waste by consuming it, you can compare the model to real life. Other lesson plans in this EPA site include: Safer Alternatives for cleaning products, and a Fun Factory, which helps kids learn how pollution might be removed from the air and water that leaves the factory.

In the news. The New York Times Daily Lesson Plan archives contain lessons regarding pollution, the biosphere, conservation, and energy. Water, Water, Everywhere, Nor Any Drop to Drink invites students to explore how water impacts their daily lives and the lives of those through history and into the future. Working in groups, students research and evaluate new technology aimed at using water in the most productive ways, and create “How It Works” posters of those systems that incorporate their research. In The Price of Power, students investigate both sides of the current political debate over regulating power plant emissions. By looking at both sides of the argument—industrial versus environmental—they research, formulate, and present arguments regarding pollution-reduction systems for coal-burning plants.

Futurama. Why worry about toxic waste now? It’s not going to affect us directly, right? Getting students to think about and care about their actions and how they can make a difference can be a challenge. Combine art and science in this simple, effective activity. Begin by having students list ways in which our society makes pollution and waste. Discuss how waste and garbage was disposed of in the past, from cavemen, to dumping sewage on the streets of Victorian England, to flushing toilets. Where does the stuff go? What will happen when it piles up? Then discuss ways in which we could treat wastes and dispose of garbage and break down toxins with other green chemicals so that the earth will be beautiful in the future as well. Get kids to draw a picture of what the world might look like in the year 2500 if we don’t take care of these wastes properly. Then have them draw an after picture of what the world could look like if we do take care of the planet. Ask kids to write a description of the differences. Have a “talk show” and interview each “guest” about how he or she can make a difference for children in the future.

Use the search box below to perform a Google search within any of the specifc sites or general domains mentioned in this Activities section.

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