Alabama (state)

H

Conservation

Alabama’s Department of Conservation and Natural Resources is responsible for control of air, water, and land pollution. It also deals with matters such as soil conservation and forest management.

H

1

Air Quality

Air quality in most of Alabama is generally excellent. However, the federal standard for ozone is sometimes exceeded in the Birmingham metropolitan area. Air pollution problems include acid rain and toxic air pollutants such as heavy metals (lead, cadmium, mercury) and volatile organic chemicals. Most of the sulfur and nitrogen emissions that cause acid rain come from electric utilities.

H

2

Waste Management

Alabama has been a major importer of hazardous waste, most of which has been sent to a commercial disposal facility near Emelle. A 1989 ban on hazardous waste imported from states that were unwilling or unable to undertake disposal programs was overturned in the early 1990s. In 2006 there were 13 hazardous waste sites on a national priority list for cleanup due to their severity or proximity to people. The state made progress in efforts to reduce pollution; in the period 1995–2000 it reduced the amount of toxic chemicals discharged into the environment by 29 percent. Most other states, however, achieved far more dramatic reductions than Alabama’s.

H

3

Water Quality

Groundwater is the source of drinking water for almost half the population and is an important source of water for agriculture and industry. Much of Alabama’s groundwater is contaminated to a limited, and not unhealthful, extent. Contaminants include organic chemicals, nitrates, fluorides, brine and salt, metals, radioactive materials, and pesticides. The sources of contamination include municipal trash landfills and hazardous waste storage ponds and impoundments.

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III

Economic Activities

From the early 19th century, Alabama’s economy was dominated by one crop—cotton. After 1915, however, the boll weevil, a beetle that infests cotton plants, so damaged the state’s cotton crop that farmers began to concentrate on raising livestock and crops other than cotton. Manufacturing began to be important to Alabama with the growth of the iron and steel industry during the early 20th century. Beginning in the 1930s low-cost power provided by the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), a federal agency, encouraged industrial development. In the late 1990s manufacturing remained the dominant economic sector. Also significantly contributing to Alabama’s gross product were the government and service sectors.

Alabama had a work force of 2,200,000 in 2006. The largest share of the jobs—33 percent—was in the service occupations, such as computer programming or catering. Another 18 percent of the workers were employed in wholesale or retail trade; 18 percent in manufacturing; 15 percent in federal, state, or local government, including those in the military; 5 percent in construction; 5 percent in transportation or public utilities; 31 percent in finance, insurance, or real estate; 2 percent in farming (including agricultural services), forestry, or fishing; and just 0.4 percent in mining. In 2005, 10 percent of Alabama’s workers were unionized.

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