RESEARCH OF DYNAMICS OF THE KEY ENVIRONMENTAL INDICATORS IN THE CITIES OF VOLGA AND URAL FEDERAL DISTRICTS
Strengthening of the urbanization processes exacerbates environmental safety problems of people living in urban areas. Environmental safety is considered by most authors as a state of protection of the natural environment and vital human interests from possible negative effects of industrial activity. At the same time, great importance is given to environmental monitoring. In this article the results of the analysis of the dynamics of key environmental indicators in large industrial cities (with more than one million inhabitants) in Volga and Ural federal districts are presented. In the course of the research, methods of comparative, correlation and regression analysis were used. It has been established that the environmental situation in the million-plus cities of Volga and Ural federal districts remains quite complicated: the number of stationary sources of atmospheric air pollution is growing and the volume of emissions of air polluting substances is increasing, while both the volume and the specific gravity of trapping and neutralizing air polluting substances from stationary sources are decreasing. A positive trend is a decrease in the volume of polluted wastewater discharges, but the quality of the water itself is poor. The management of removal and processing of municipal solid waste remains a problem area. Against the background of an increase in the amount of current expenditures on environmental protection, a decrease in their specific weight is observed in relation to the volume of shipped goods of own production, while the amount of financing of current expenditures on environmental protection does not depend on the volume of pollution produced, but on the economic results, which once again emphasizes the priority of economic interests over the interests of ensuring environmental safety.