Acid Rain (1840 words) Essay Example For Students

Acid Rain (1840 words) Essay Acid RainannonINTRODUCTION: Acid rain is a great problem in our world. It causes fishand plants to die in our waters. As well it causes harm to our own race aswell, because we eat these fish, drink this water and eat these plants. Itis a problem that we must all face together and try to get rid of. Howeveracid rain on its own is not the biggest problem. It cause many otherproblems such as aluminum poisoning. Acid Rain is deadly. WHAT IS ACID RAIN?Acid rain is all the rain, snow, mist etc that falls from the skyonto our planet that contains an unnatural acidic. It is not to beconfused with uncontaminated rain that falls, for that rain is naturallyslightly acidic. It is caused by todays industry. When products aremanufactured many chemicals are used to create it. However because of thedifficulty and cost of properly disposing of these products they are oftenemitted into the atmosphere with little or no treatment. The term was first considered to be important about 20 years ago whenscientists in Sweden and Norway first believed that acidic rain may becausing great ecological damage to the planet. The problem was that by thetime that the scientist found the problem it was already very large. Detecting an acid lake is often quite difficult. A lake does not becomeacid over night. It happens over a period of many years, some timesdecades. The changes are usually to gradual for them to be noticed early. At the beginning of the 20th century most rivers/lakes like the riverTovdal in Norway had not yet begun to die. However by 1926 localinspectors were noticing that many of the lakes were beginning to showsigns of death. Fish were found dead along the banks of many rivers. Asthe winters ice began to melt off more and more hundreds upon hundredsmore dead fish (trout in particular) were being found. It was at this timethat scientist began to search for the reason. As the scientists continuedto work they found many piles of dead fish, up to 5000 in one pile,further up the river. Divers were sent in to examine the bottom of therivers. What they found were many more dead fish. Many live and deadspecimens were taken back to labs across Norway. When the live specimenswere examined they were found to have very little sodium in their blood. This is typical a typical symptom of acid poisoning. The acid had enteredthe gills of the fish and poisoned them so that they were unable toextract salt from the water to maintain their bodies sodium levels. Many scientist said that this acid poising was due to the fact thatit was just after the winter and that all the snow and ice was runningdown into the streams and lakes. They believed that the snow had beenexposed to many natural phenomena that gave the snow its high acidcontent. Other scientists were not sure that this theory was correctbecause at the time that the snow was added to the lakes and streams thePh levels would change from around 5.2 to 4.6. They believed that such ahigh jump could not be attributed to natural causes. They believed that itwas due to air pollution. They were right. Since the beginning of theIndustrial revolution in England pollution had been affecting all thetrees,soil and rivers in Europe and North America. However until recently the loses of fish was contained to thesouthern parts of Europe. Because of the constant onslaught of acid rainlakes and rivers began to lose their ability to counter act their affects. Much of the alkaline elements; such as calcium and limestone; in the soilhad been washed away. It is these lakes that we must be worried about forthey will soon become extinct. The power of love EssayAt this time the pH was of 5.8. New trout were failing to be producedbecause many smaller organisms that served as food to it had been wipedout earlier. With not enough food the older fish did not have the energyto reproduce. Upon reaching the pH of 5.1 it was noted that the troutbecame cannibals. It is believed this is due to the fact that the minnowwas nearly extinct. At a pH of 5.6 the external skeletons of crayfish softened and theywere soon infected with parasites, and there eggs were destroyed by fungi. When the pH went down to 5.1 they were almost gone. By the end of theexperiment none of the major species had survived the trials of the acid. The next experiment conducted by the scientists was to try and bring thelake back to life. They cut in half the amount of acid that they dumped tosimulate a large scale cleanup. Soon again the cuckers and minnows beganto reproduce again. The lake eventually did come back; to a certainextent; back to life. THE NEW THEORY:A scientist in Norway had a problem believing that it was the acidrain on its own that was affecting the lakes in such a deadly way. Thisscientist was Dr Rosenqvist. Why is it that during heavy rain, the swollen rivers can be up tofifteen times more acid than the rain? It cannot be the rain alone that isdoing it, can it? Many scientist shunned him for this however they couldnot come up with a better answer. Soon the scientists were forced toaccept this theory. Sulfuric acid is composed of two parts, know as ions. The hydrogenion is what make a substance acid. The other ion is sulphate. When thereare more hydrogen ions then a substance is acid. It is this sulphate ionthat we are interested in. When the rain causes rivers to overboard ontothe banks the river water passes through the soil. Since the industrialrevolution in britain there has been an increasing amount of sulphur inthe soil. In the river there is not enough sulphur for the acid to reactin great quantities. However in the soil there is a great collection ofsulphur to aid the reaction. When it joins the water the pH becomes muchlower. This is the most deadly effect of acid rain on our water!!! Thewater itself does not contain enough sulphur to kill off its populationof fish and plants. But with the sulphur in the soil it does. CONCLUSION:Acid rain is a big problem. It causes the death of our lakes, ourrivers, our wild life and most importantly us. As well it causes otherproblems that are very serious as well such as the release of aluminiumand lead into our water supplies. We are suffering because of it. InScotland there are many birth defects being attributed to it. We must cutdown the releases of chemicals that cause it. But it will take time, evenif we were to stop today we would have the problem for years to comebecause of the build up in the soil. Lets hope we can do something. BIBLIOGRAPHYPenguin Publishing House, 1987 , Pearce Fred Acid Rain. What is it andwhat is it doing to us?New York Publishers, 1989, William Stone Acid Rain. Fiend or Foe?Lucent books, Inc. 1990, Steward Gail Acid Rain.