Environmental issues in Syria Attacks on oil refineries can cause oil fires which release harmful chemicals into the air, such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The sulphur and nitrogen compounds are linked to acid rain which can have dire impacts on vegetation as well as cause soil acidification. PAHs persist in the environment for long periods of time and are known carcinogens. Syria also extracts heavy crude oil, which generally has a higher proportion of noxious substances, including heavy metals, making it especially dangerous when these substances seep into the soil. Syria has two oil refineries. The
Sulfur dioxide Sulfur dioxide Sulfur dioxide (also sulphur dioxide in British English) is the chemical compound with the formula . It is a toxic gas with a burnt match smell. It is released naturally by volcanic activity and is produced as a by-product of the burning of fossil fuels contaminated with sulfur compounds and copper extraction. SO is a bent molecule with "C" symmetry point group. A valence bond theory approach considering just "s" and "p" orbitals would describe the bonding in terms of resonance between two resonance structures. The sulfur–oxygen bond has a bond order of 1.5. There is support for