Thaindian News

Toronto, March 29 (IANS) With birds chirping and temperatures warming, spring is finally in the air. But unknown to many, springtime has a dark side too — accumulated contaminants.

“During the winter months, contaminants accumulate in the snow,” says Torsten Meyer, an expert on snow-bound organic contaminants and a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Toronto-Scarborough.

“When the snow melts, these chemicals are released into the environment at high concentrations,” he said, according to a Toronto-Scarborough statement.

Meyer’s research reveals a worrying surprise. “One of the main findings is that there is a peak contaminant flush at the very beginning of the melt,” he says. With the advent of spring, according to Meyer, comes a deluge of pollution.

By the time snow has turned black with muck and grime, many harmful chemicals, including those from pesticides, car exhaust, telecom wiring insulation, water repellent clothing, paints or coatings, may have already seeped out of the snow and into the surrounding ground water or surface water.

Although Meyer views his work as fundamental research, his findings have obvious real-world implications, such as how municipalities choose their snow dump sites.

According to Meyer, cities and towns should be very careful to select well-contained sites to protect against that early flush of pollutants.

His research is unique because previous studies on snowmelt contaminants have all used either natural snow or very low volumes of artificially produced snow.

He is also one of only a handful of researchers in the world who study snow and organic contaminants.