mentioned. The microbiology itself contains very usefulinformation on selected specialist areas often ignored inconventional texts on biological wastewater treatment.

After an introduction de® ning some basic terms inmicrobiology, the second chapter describes the basics ofmicroscopy and staining, in particular the Gram stain andspore stains. The third chapter gives a concise account of thetypes and structure of bacteria, with useful coverage ofactinomycetes and the causes of sludge bulking and heavyfoam formation in activated sludge plants, as well as someinteresting points about bacteriophages.After short chapterson fungi and algae, the account of protozoa is unusuallydetailed for a text of this length, with useful ideas on theiruse as indicators of the state of health of activated sludge.This is followed by short chapters on biochemistry,microbial growth and inhibition and an interesting accountof disease, and the book concludes with a section onpractical applications, comprising practical bacteriology,coliforms and the bacteriological examination of water andan appendix on membrane ® ltration and veri® cation offaecal coliforms.

The coverage of microbiology is not very systematic andfar from meeting the stated aim of the book, which is `toprovide a comprehensive discussion of microbiologicalconcepts as they relate to water and wastewater’ . The textis probably of most use to someone who is familiar withthe basics of wastewater treatment and is looking for somemicrobiological background to the subject. The mainproblem with the text is that it is littered with errors.Although they are typically `word-processing’ errors whichwere not picked up in proof-reading, they could bemisleading to a reader with insuf® cient experience torealize that they are errors. For example, in the `de® nitionof key terms’ in respect of fungi, Nonseptate or aseptate isgiven as meaning `when crosswalls are present’ , rotifersare said to `range in size from about 0.1±0.8 nm’ , and`Nocardia are complex micro-organisms with a low pHvalue’ . A third of the text is devoted to the section onpractical bacteriology, describing basic procedures suchas plating out and staining, and standard tests. This wouldbe very useful were it not for the lurking errors: in faecalcoliform determination, test tubes are to be incubated `at0.2°C water-bath’ . Read with caution, the text can be agold-mine of useful snippets of information, but I fear aninexperienced student would ® nd the book confusing.

Environmental Chemical AnalysisB. B. Kebbekus and S. MitraBlackie Academic and Professional, 1998330 pp, £24.99ISBN 0 7514 0456 X

Reviewed by Mike Bennett (Environmental TechnologyCentre, Department of Chemical Engineering, UMIST, UK)

Obtaining reliable measurements of environmental con-taminants is a task not to be underestimated. Kebbekus andMitra lead us through a broad introduction to the ® eld,describing the analytical techniques available and puttingthem into the context of practical sampling procedures. Thebook gives a very basic account of the statistics of samplingand of quality control; it discusses spectroscopy, chromato-graphy and mass spectrometry; and it shows how these

techniques may be applied to the analysis of air, water orsolids. The book is aimed at students in engineeringor environmental sciences: the breadth of treatment andthe modest price make it a suitable choice for anundergraduate course. I found it useful in areas of samplingwhere previously I had been ignorant. The authors alsoprovide useful exercises for the student.

Inevitably, breadth has been at the expense of depth.Merely reading the text will not qualify the student as ananalyst. But it is a good start and the book includes usefulreferences to standard textbooks on particular aspects ofanalysis.

The book would have more bite if the authors added afew horror stories, recounting environmental analyseswhich went disastrously wrong and why. (One might, forexample, think of environmental sampling for tracequantities of explosives.) This should concentrate thestudent’s mind on the importance of good QA/QC.

I suppose that all academics are harassed and over-worked. The authors have allowed a few errors to creepthrough the proof-reading. Note, for example, that Ni63rather than Ni65 is used in electron capture detectors; thatacetonitrile is not methanol (page 135); and that volumetricconcentration is not measured in mm/m3 . Generally, Ishould have been happier with concentrations in air beingexpressed volumetrically as mixing ratios (ppm, etc.), orgravimetrically in SI notation (mg m± 3 , etc.). I also note thatthe standard method of determination of SO2 in air is nowpulsed ¯ uorescence rather than ¯ ame photometry. We usedto use the latter but it suffers from all the instrumentaldif® culties that Kebbekus and Mitra describe, besides thepractical dif® culty of providing a H2 supply to a ® eldinstrument. (Particular entertainment may be had when theH2 is produced electrolytically and water instead of gas issucked into the reaction chamber.)

May I also point out that `actual’ is too frequentlyactually meaningless?

Being a physicist rather than an analytical chemist, Ifound the description of column ef® ciency in a chromato-graph somewhat confusing. There appears to be an elisionbetween length and time for the plate height, H and thewidth of the peak, w. The latter was in fact left unde® nedbut appears to be the time-width of the signal at twostandard deviations from the mean retention time, tr .De® ning H as (spatial variance)/(column length), theresults given as Equations (4.9) and (4.10) then followimmediately.

On a philosophical point, I was unhappy with thedescription of con® dence intervals. It is a misconceptionto believe that if we calculate the 95% con® dence limits ofa variable to be xL and xH , then there is a 95% chance that xlies between these two values. We cannot put a probabilityon reality. Rather we should say that if x in fact liesoutside this range, and that the statistical assumptions wehave made in calculating the con® dence interval are in factcorrect, then measurements as extremely high or low asthose obtained would only have been observed on 5% oftrials. On this basis, we may ® nd it implausible that xshould lie outside the range {xL , xH }. The choice of whatshould be considered `extreme’ is a subjective one: had wesuspected fraud, for example, we might have rejected areported dataset if it implied a result too close to somedesired value! Con® dence limits should thus be regarded not

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as a probability distribution, mechanically arrived at, butrather as an expression of what as investigators we might® nd plausible.

These minor points can be put right in the second edition.I hope the book sells well.

1998 Pollution HandbookÐ The Essential Guide to UKand European Pollution Control LegislationLoveday Murley (ed)National Society for Clean Air and EnvironmentalProtection (NSCA), 1998525 pp, £29.95ISBN 0 903474 41 7

Reviewed by Richard Grif® ths (Environmental TechnologyCentre, Department of Chemical Engineering, UMIST, UK)

The NSCA Pollution Handbook, published annually since1985, grows by the year re¯ ecting the pace of developmentof regulatory matters in the UK. The 1998 edition containsthe following chapters:

(1) Integrated Pollution Control and other principles ofcontrol:

· General principles;

· Implementation and enforcement authorities;

· Integrated Pollution Control;

· Nuisance;

· Access to environmental information;

· Planning control and environmental assessment;

· Environmental management and audit systems;

· Environmental liability.

(2) Air pollution:

· Early controls;

· International and European initiatives;

· Implementation and enforcement authorities;

· Air quality management;

· Regulation of industrial emissions;

· Regulation of agricultural pollution;

· Regulation of pollution from road vehicles;

· Aircraft emissions;

· Radiation;

· Control of process odours.

(3) Noise pollution:

· General neighbourhood noise;

· Regulatory controls on neighbourhood noise nuisance;

· Entertainment noise;

· Industrial and construction site noise;

· Road traf® c noise;

· Aircraft noise;

· Rail noise;

· Occupational noise;

· Low frequency noise;

· Measurement of noise.

(4) Waste pollution:

· Waste, general;

· The European Union and waste management;

· Implementation and enforcement authorities;

· Waste on land: regulatory controls;

· Contaminated land;

· Litter;

· Radioactive waste.

(5) Water pollution:

· Introduction to controls on water pollution;

· The European Union and water pollution control;

· Implementation and enforcement authorities;

· Regulatory controls;

· Marine pollution;

· Pesticides.

Appendices:

· Integrated Pollution Control and other principles ofcontrol;

· Air pollution;

· Noise pollution (no material in this appendix this year);

· Waste pollution;

· Water;

· The European Union and the environment;

· SI units in environmental technology and conversionfactors.

There is a useful bibliography organized into topic areas,and the ten-page index is very thorough.

The preface identi® es a number of developments thathave taken place since the updating to December 1997.

The alternative to this handbook and its approach isthe looseleaf updatable type of legislative and regulatorysummary, with the associated costs of an annual subscrip-tion. The NSCA Pollution Handbook is very modestlypriced, and is most excellent value. It is highly commendedto anyone who needs a comprehensive reference to thevery wide range of regulatory matters that now impingeupon the environment.

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