Clean Air Act Quiz and Flashcards

Study Notes

The State shall protect and advance the right of the people to a balanced and healthful ecology
The State recognizes the principle that "polluters must pay"
The State shall pursue a policy of balancing development and environmental protection
The framework for sustainable development shall be pursued
Key definitions:
- Air pollution: any alteration of the physical, chemical, and biological properties of the atmospheric air
- Air pollutant: any matter found in the atmosphere other than oxygen, nitrogen, water vapor, carbon dioxide, and inert gases
- Emissions: any air contaminant, pollutant, gas stream, or unwanted sound from a known source
- Greenhouse gases: gases that can potentially or reasonably be expected to induce global warming
- Mobile source/motor vehicle: any vehicle propelled by a gasoline or diesel engine or by any means other than human or animal power
- Stationary source: any building or immobile structure, facility, or installation that emits or may emit any air pollutant

The State shall adopt a systematic, comprehensive, and ecological solid waste management program
The program shall ensure the protection of public health and the environment
Key definitions:
- Solid wastes: all discarded household, commercial, non-hazardous institutional, and industrial waste
- Ecological solid waste management: a systematic and comprehensive approach to managing solid waste, which includes segregation, collection, transportation, storage, treatment, and disposal
Objectives:
- Ensure the protection of public health and the environment
- Utilize environmentally sound methods for solid waste management
- Promote national research and development programs for improved solid waste management and resource conservation techniques

The State shall pursue a policy of economic growth in a manner consistent with the protection, preservation, and revival of the quality of fresh, brackish, and marine waters
Key definitions:
- Discharge: includes, but is not limited to, the act of spilling, leaking, pumping, pouring, emitting, emptying, releasing, or dumping of any material into a water body or onto land
- Effluent: discharges from a known source that is passed into a body of water or land
- Water pollution: any alteration of the physical, chemical, biological, or radiological properties of a water body resulting in the impairment of its purity or quality
Objectives:
- Streamline processes and procedures in the prevention, control, and abatement of pollution of the country's water resources
- Promote environmental strategies, use of appropriate economic instruments, and control mechanisms for the protection of water resources

The State shall regulate, restrict, or prohibit the importation, manufacture, processing, sale, distribution, use, and disposal of chemical substances and mixtures that present unreasonable risk and/or injury to health or the environment
Key definitions:
- Hazardous wastes: substances that are without any safe commercial, industrial, agricultural, or economic usage and are shipped, transported, or brought from the country of origin for dumping or disposal
Objectives:
- Keep an inventory of chemicals being imported, manufactured, or used in the Philippines
- Monitor and regulate the importation, manufacture, processing, handling, storage, transportation, sale, distribution, use, and disposal of chemical substances and mixtures
- Inform and educate the populace regarding the hazards and risks attendant to the manufacture, handling, storage, transportation, processing, distribution, use, and disposal of toxic chemicals and other substances and mixtures

The State shall conserve and protect wildlife resources and their habitats for sustainability
Key definitions:
- Wildlife resources: all living organisms, including animals, plants, and microorganisms
- Habitat: the natural environment in which a species or population lives
Objectives:
- Conserve and protect wildlife species and their habitats to promote ecological balance and enhance biological diversity
- Regulate the collection and trade of wildlife
- Pursue, with due regard to the national interest, the Philippine commitment to international conventions for the protection of wildlife and their habitats