WEBVTT - SYSK Selects: Whatever happened to acid rain? 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:03.520 M Hey everybody, it's me Josh and for this week's 0:00:03.680 --> 0:00:06.520 S Y s K Selects, I've chosen whatever happened to 0:00:06.640 --> 0:00:10.360 Acid Rain from back in two thousand twelve. It's the 0:00:10.440 --> 0:00:13.480 story of one of those really neat rare times when 0:00:13.600 --> 0:00:17.520 humanity came together and said, no, no more, we're going 0:00:17.560 --> 0:00:20.439 to actually save the plan at this time. Let's hope 0:00:20.480 --> 0:00:23.160 we can do this again. In the meantime, sit back 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:31.600 and enjoy. Welcome to Stuff You should Know, a production 0:00:31.640 --> 0:00:39.840 of I Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, and welcome 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:43.360 to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, There's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, 0:00:43.440 --> 0:00:46.600 and we're doing this again. We're bringing the science this 0:00:46.720 --> 0:00:54.200 time for once in our lives. Acid Rain, Yeah, failing 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:58.080 down from the acid clouds. That's not how that song goes. 0:00:58.720 --> 0:01:01.200 That's not how acid rain by to John Daego, that 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:03.080 guy is so great. We watched that again the other 0:01:03.160 --> 0:01:06.120 day just by a chance, and I hadn't seen it 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:08.720 in a couple of years, and it's still just these 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:10.720 are hard to like Chad said, our friend, it's hard 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:13.320 to believe that that voice comes out of that guy, 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:17.880 and he's kind a new one. Like Mother Economy, good. Yeah, Yeah, 0:01:17.959 --> 0:01:20.880 he's a good guy. Um. I don't know what chocolate 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:24.319 rains about, but there's a good call out. I would 0:01:24.319 --> 0:01:28.120 be very interested to hear everyone's interpretation of what chocolate 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:32.960 rain means good. I'd like to hear that too. Um. 0:01:33.120 --> 0:01:38.200 Let's see, Chuck. Do you remember back in the eighties 0:01:39.720 --> 0:01:46.440 hearing about two things too terrifying environmental things. One the 0:01:46.520 --> 0:01:51.960 ozone layer, specifically the whole in the ozone layer, and 0:01:52.200 --> 0:01:56.080 two acid rain. You throw an apartheid and that is 0:01:56.120 --> 0:02:01.320 the eighties. Yeah, I'm not gonna play sen City nope. Um, yeah, 0:02:01.320 --> 0:02:05.280 that's pretty much. Also, don't forget cocaine, Ronald Reagan, jelly 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:11.240 Beans and the A Team and Magnum. But he kind 0:02:11.240 --> 0:02:13.440 of transcends the eighties really, if you ask me, he's 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:18.160 just a man of all time. Fair. Yeah, never gets told. Um. 0:02:18.760 --> 0:02:21.600 The weird thing is is, since I guess maybe the 0:02:21.600 --> 0:02:23.960 mid nineties or whatever, you don't hear about any of 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:28.320 those things except for Magnum any longer. Yeah. Because of 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:31.240 of course, global warming took over and everyone's afraid we're 0:02:31.240 --> 0:02:33.839 gonna melt now, and so they said, well, we don't 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:36.200 need to worry about acid rain anymore. We fix that problem, right. 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:38.679 I think there's a perception that you know, acid rain 0:02:38.800 --> 0:02:42.520 was fixed and taken care of, and astoundingly in a 0:02:42.520 --> 0:02:45.240 lot of ways it has been. Yeah, they've come a 0:02:45.280 --> 0:02:47.919 long way, baby, those on layer, by the way, has 0:02:47.960 --> 0:02:49.840 not been As a matter of fact, another one opened 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:53.079 up in the Antarctic. Now now we have two. But 0:02:53.480 --> 0:02:56.800 that's a that's another topic of discussion. Acid rain, let's 0:02:56.800 --> 0:02:59.040 get back to it, though, is a very uh, it's 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:01.079 a nice success to or in a lot of ways, 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:06.119 and it came from a comprehensive understanding of a problem 0:03:06.160 --> 0:03:10.280 and a comprehensive will to address it. That's right, that's 0:03:10.280 --> 0:03:12.800 how you take care of stuff. There is still a 0:03:12.840 --> 0:03:16.239 long way to go though, you always bringing me back 0:03:16.240 --> 0:03:18.680 down earth. Not completely fixed, but it is good. It's 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:21.960 heartwarming to know that you can see a problem and 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:26.600 and reduce something like acid rain. Precisely so, Chuck, what 0:03:26.840 --> 0:03:31.400 is acid rain? Acid rain, Josh, is a trans boundary issue, 0:03:31.560 --> 0:03:35.640 which means even though it just occurs in the mainly 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:38.440 occurs in the northern hemisphere, it's still is going to 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:41.120 cross over and effect the rest of the world. And 0:03:41.160 --> 0:03:44.160 the reason that's worth mentioning is because for many years 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.800 up until the nineteen eighties, Um, they thought it was 0:03:47.840 --> 0:03:51.160 a very local problem. Yeah. Uh, and then they realized, 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:53.880 oh no, it's not, and everybody kind of got on 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:56.520 board with fixing it. That's try. Um, But like you said, 0:03:56.520 --> 0:04:01.440 northern hemisphere, it occurs mostly there because we're the dirtiest, 0:04:01.760 --> 0:04:05.640 more industrial, most polluting. Yeah. So specifically, what it is, 0:04:05.840 --> 0:04:12.400 UM is rain with acid in it. Literally, uh, emissions 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:16.040 of sulfur dioxide s O two, nitrogen oxides in O 0:04:16.360 --> 0:04:20.000 X from things like cars and factories, power plants, all 0:04:20.000 --> 0:04:24.440 those nasty things, lightning strikes, volcanoes, the natural ones UM. 0:04:24.560 --> 0:04:28.560 They will actually react with water vapor in the atmosphere 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:33.320 and turn into acid, sulfuric and nitric acids, and they 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:38.479 can fall in the form of wet rain, um, snow, sleet, fog, 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:43.080 or they can be deposited as particulates and gases. That's 0:04:43.279 --> 0:04:47.120 dry acid rain. Well, the whole dry things called acid 0:04:47.160 --> 0:04:50.359 deposition because it can be wet or dry, right, and 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:53.719 it's being deposited exactly on the earth. Yeah, that's what 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:56.960 that word is. It's branched from deposit, isn't it. I 0:04:56.960 --> 0:05:00.400 think so? Yeah, it didn't even occur to me. Um, 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:05.480 and so you so bravo unexplaining acid rain, and bravo 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:07.480 Sarah Dowdy who wrote this. Yeah, she did a very 0:05:07.480 --> 0:05:11.040 good job on this. UM. And when you can't just 0:05:11.080 --> 0:05:13.599 be like, well this this rain seems a little hanky, 0:05:13.800 --> 0:05:15.880 so we're going to say that that's acid rain, they 0:05:15.920 --> 0:05:20.360 actually know. Um, there's a there's a very um strict 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:24.560 definition of what constitutes acid rain, and they used the 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:27.400 pH scale to determine it, good old pH scale. So 0:05:27.520 --> 0:05:31.480 the pH scale is um this spectrum between highly acidic 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:36.400 and highly basic, right, and um, acid rain obviously falls 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:39.039 towards the acidic side of the scale. And in the 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:42.720 middle of this scale is pure water. And that's at 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:46.240 a seven point. Oh, it's not at zero. It's entirely neutral. 0:05:46.240 --> 0:05:48.760 It's neither basic nor acidic. Yeah. I just find it 0:05:48.760 --> 0:05:52.080 interesting that it's a scale of zero to fourteen with 0:05:52.160 --> 0:05:54.880 seven being in the middle. Seven's in the middle of 0:05:54.960 --> 0:05:58.200 zero to fourteen. Yeah, But I mean it just for me, 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.239 I would say zero is neutral and anything above would 0:06:01.240 --> 0:06:05.120 be negative. But whatever. In the Grand tradition of um 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:08.520 civilization established by the Romans, though, the pH scale starts 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:12.360 at one rather than zero. Um, but yeah, I see 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:16.159 what you're saying. Actually here, I like the fact I 0:06:16.200 --> 0:06:18.320 think it goes from one to fourteen. Well, then Sarah 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:22.320 got it wrong. Um, in the the graph here says 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:26.600 one to fourteen. I wonder, um, but back to its 0:06:26.600 --> 0:06:34.680 sevens in the middle either way, six seven, Yeah, so 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:38.520 it would start at zero, I guess. Um, So the 0:06:39.279 --> 0:06:42.080 more acidic is the lower numbers, and the more basic 0:06:42.160 --> 0:06:45.640 is the higher numbers. Right. The thing is is rain 0:06:45.960 --> 0:06:49.760 isn't neutral. No, normal rain still is slightly acidic, and 0:06:49.800 --> 0:06:54.960 it hits about five point six on the pH scale, right, Um, 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:59.120 so why well, it combines with carbon dioxide in the 0:06:59.160 --> 0:07:04.880 atmosphere to form as slightly acidic um carbonic acid deposition, 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:09.000 which is branched from the root word deposit. That's right. 0:07:09.360 --> 0:07:13.000 Um so, uh so acid rain is something like five 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:16.960 point three to four point oh as far as um 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:21.920 acidity goes right, four point three to five okay, Um, yeah, 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:25.880 that's a big difference. Um. And it's something like what 0:07:25.920 --> 0:07:30.360 the the acidity between orange juice and black coffee? Yeah, 0:07:30.400 --> 0:07:32.760 which Sarah is keen to point out, which is a 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:34.880 bit of a misnomer. While that's true, you can't say 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:36.720 well like, well, it's just like coffee. And then you're like, 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:38.880 that's not gonna the coffee in your grass and it's 0:07:38.880 --> 0:07:43.120 not gonna kill it. See I'm and yeah, my hat 0:07:43.160 --> 0:07:45.320 was off to her for saying, like what boa we 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:47.880 don't just be like orange juice is fine. Coffee is fine, 0:07:48.000 --> 0:07:49.800 because if you think about it, if a rained orange 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:52.640 juice all the time, it'd probably have the same impact. 0:07:53.120 --> 0:07:55.760 Be awesome. Now, just like hold the old cup out 0:07:55.760 --> 0:07:57.880 the window at the morning, I'd be like, oh, it's 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:03.320 with pulp today. Um. The problem with acid rain, though, Josh, 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:08.000 even though it is has the acidity of a coffee 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:11.800 or an orange juice, it um can wreck small parts 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:14.320 of an ecosystem. And as we all know, if you 0:08:14.360 --> 0:08:17.240 wreck small parts of an ecosystem, there's a domino effect 0:08:17.240 --> 0:08:21.200 that occurs that spreads throughout an ecosystem. One of the 0:08:21.240 --> 0:08:25.200 most valuable things on the planet is something like plankton. Yeah, 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:27.960 plankton is high currents. It's like honey buns in prison, 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:31.080 but for them, yeah, you know, pretty much. And when plankton, 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:35.599 which is very very sensitive, that changes in pH um, 0:08:35.760 --> 0:08:39.160 especially when it becomes more acidic. When plankton dies in 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:45.360 small invertebrates die then yeah, it starves out the larger animals, 0:08:45.720 --> 0:08:49.160 fish and frogs, and then we start to get hungry, 0:08:49.280 --> 0:08:52.760 especially the French who we frog legs e g. Acid 0:08:52.880 --> 0:08:55.320 Rain is a huge problem in France, that's right. And 0:08:55.360 --> 0:08:59.960 eventually it's just mass hysteria pretty much cats and dogs 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:03.200 living together kimberally from different strokes into with green hair. 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:06.440 That's right. Uh. There are a couple of UM programs 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.800 UM that monitor this. UH. In the US, the National 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:15.000 Atmospheric Deposition Program and they handled the wet deposition and 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:17.760 the clean Air Status and Trends Network UM handled the 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:21.199 dry And what they're looking for is trying to determine 0:09:21.559 --> 0:09:25.720 the critical load, which is how much an ecosystem can 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:30.679 UM take before it starts saying, Man, I'm breaking down. 0:09:31.240 --> 0:09:34.600 You're killing me with his stuff. UM. And the pH 0:09:34.640 --> 0:09:40.040 scale is determined by UH, the concentration of hydrogen ions 0:09:40.160 --> 0:09:43.520 right in a substance. That's what makes it either UM 0:09:43.600 --> 0:09:47.600 acidic or basic. Right. So what these programs are doing 0:09:47.720 --> 0:09:52.360 is measuring the concentration of hydrogen ions to determine acidity. 0:09:52.520 --> 0:09:55.199 And they say, oh, well, this is this is too 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:58.440 much science. I would just walk out and be like, 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:01.600 look at this this plank and it's not looking very healthy. 0:10:01.679 --> 0:10:04.280 This is acidic. I don't even need to measure this stuff. 0:10:04.679 --> 0:10:07.920 You can just spot unhappy plankton pretty much nice. It's 0:10:07.960 --> 0:10:09.400 not how it Once you know what to look for, 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:12.079 I'll teach you sometimes it's not hard. When you've met 0:10:12.080 --> 0:10:15.280 happy plankton, your life will never be the same. The 0:10:15.320 --> 0:10:20.040 difference is like night and day. So um surface waters 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:24.439 are where acid rain is going to hit you most 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:28.240 initially um precipitation, And you don't really think about this. 0:10:28.320 --> 0:10:30.600 You think it, well, it rains in a lake, what 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:32.360 in a and in a river? What it does is 0:10:32.360 --> 0:10:35.880 it rains on the ground. And although sure it rains 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:38.280 on the water surface, it's also going to run through 0:10:38.360 --> 0:10:41.920 soil to get to water. Right. One of the purposes 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:46.800 of soil. One of the functions that provides is um buffering. Uh, 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:52.240 water that percolates through it toward groundwater, towards bodies of water. 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:56.360 And what's buffering me? Well, it has the ability to 0:10:56.440 --> 0:11:00.240 neutralize acids. Yeah, and then awesome, yeah, I think it 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:06.720 brings everything more towards purified water or neutral pH right, yeah, 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:10.439 but I think specifically with a lot of like the um. 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:13.280 The minerals that are in the soil, like say calcium, 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:18.640 they counteract acidic um rain acidic water to bring it 0:11:18.679 --> 0:11:22.440 more toward neutral Right. The problem is when the soil's 0:11:22.520 --> 0:11:25.880 buffering capacity is overloaded, there's just too much for it 0:11:25.920 --> 0:11:29.800 to handle. A lot of that unneutralized acid gets passed 0:11:29.800 --> 0:11:32.440 along into the body of water, and then you start 0:11:32.480 --> 0:11:35.920 to have those big problems with the little unhappy plankton. Yeah, 0:11:35.960 --> 0:11:39.920 it's almost like a water filter that's past its date, 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:43.240 you know, it just can't filter anymore. Nice analogy, Thank you. 0:11:59.200 --> 0:12:11.640 That's why why ska um. So we've talked about what 0:12:11.720 --> 0:12:14.320 happens where the French end up with a lot of 0:12:14.320 --> 0:12:20.480 big problems in um coastal areas. Uh, nitrogen, Remember we 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:24.440 have UM what is it? Sulfuric acid? And what acid? 0:12:25.880 --> 0:12:29.720 What for acid? Raine? Yeah, nitric acid? Okay, So nitric 0:12:29.760 --> 0:12:33.280 acid is based on nitrogen. Nitrogen has a really interesting 0:12:33.320 --> 0:12:38.880 impact on coastal waters where when it's deposited UM, it 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:45.000 supports algae blooms because algae love nitrogen. And when algae 0:12:45.040 --> 0:12:49.120 blooms take place, algae starts to die eventually, and they 0:12:49.160 --> 0:12:55.560 sustain bacteria specifically aerobic bacteria that flourishes itself and sucks 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:59.760 up all the oxygen in the water, starving fish, shellfish, 0:13:00.360 --> 0:13:05.000 um plants, and eventually like leading to at the very 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:08.480 least a strain, if not a collapse on coastal ecosystem. So, 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:13.679 too much acid rain will increase algae. Increased algae means 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:17.760 increased dyeing algae, and increased dyeing algae means increased bacteria, 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:23.040 and they rob fishes of their oxygen. Yeah, that's a 0:13:23.080 --> 0:13:25.240 domino effect. One of the things I love about acid 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:29.439 rain is just how elegantly understandable it is. It is 0:13:29.559 --> 0:13:31.840 very basic and simple. I love it. It's not basic 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:37.240 acidic UM. So this we're not done with the soil too, 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:41.640 by the way, in a in an addition to UM, 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:46.439 I guess decreasing its buffering capacity or overloading its buffering 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:53.120 capacity UM. Acid rain has the terrible habit of drawing 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:56.800 aluminum out of the soil. Yeah, it's normally locked in 0:13:56.840 --> 0:13:59.600 the soil. Acid rain draws it out, which means that 0:13:59.640 --> 0:14:02.960 tree it can suck it up, and that's poison to them. 0:14:03.000 --> 0:14:07.240 That's a toxin. Yeah. And Sarah makes a good point here. 0:14:07.280 --> 0:14:10.520 It's not like a it's not a situation where you're 0:14:10.520 --> 0:14:13.160 gonna find a rainforest has leveled all of a sudden 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:16.480 because of acid rain, or you're gonna find a lake 0:14:17.000 --> 0:14:20.880 or a river that looks nasty and decaying and disgusting 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:24.800 water might actually look cleaner. Yeah, and then ironic it is. 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:28.200 It's ironic and beautiful. And um, what it's gonna do 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:31.440 to your forest is it's gonna stunt its growth and 0:14:31.560 --> 0:14:35.400 over time it's gonna have an effect. Yeah, like you're 0:14:35.440 --> 0:14:42.120 gonna have bald trees. Um. Because in addition to this, 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:45.120 toxins coming out in the soil on low lying areas 0:14:45.200 --> 0:14:50.280 from acid rain um, and it also degrading helpful minerals 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:52.400 like we said, like calcium and other things that trees 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:58.760 also use. UM. In higher elevations, that acid rain turns 0:14:58.760 --> 0:15:01.680 into an acid fall. That is added. That's crazy to 0:15:01.720 --> 0:15:03.960 me that that I'm going to say at this time, 0:15:04.120 --> 0:15:08.440 that is a great band name, Acid fog. Yeah. Uh. 0:15:08.760 --> 0:15:11.440 But so just imagine like trees bathing in that all 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:15.200 the time, um, that that strips their leaves and basically 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:18.920 makes them chili. Yeah. And that's why when you see 0:15:19.360 --> 0:15:24.160 mountains in the Appalachian Mountains that have bald peaks. It's 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:27.440 not because trees can't grow up there. They could grow 0:15:27.520 --> 0:15:30.680 up there if they weren't sucking in and being surrounded 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:35.440 by acid clouds. That's nuts. Just it doesn't have to 0:15:35.440 --> 0:15:37.880 be a rain in right, Yeah, you know, it's just 0:15:37.960 --> 0:15:42.000 in particulates in the air. Uh. And that that kind 0:15:42.000 --> 0:15:46.400 of leads to how it affects us because we are 0:15:46.640 --> 0:15:51.080 not nearly as sensitive to these kind of changes um 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:53.880 with acid that that acid rain brings. Right now, it's 0:15:53.920 --> 0:15:57.000 not gonna burn. You know, you can swim in a lake, uh, 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:00.880 an acid lake, and you will be fine. Um. But 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:05.040 an acidic lake, let's say. And yeah, because it's just 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:08.120 above battery acid. So you couldn't swim in a battery 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:11.800 acid like that. That's terrible. Um, But you could swim 0:16:11.800 --> 0:16:15.960 in an acidic lake as far as acid rains concerned. Um. 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:21.720 The problem comes with that dry deposition the um sulfuric 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:27.480 and nitric ox or nitric acids combine UH in low 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:33.200 lying areas with ozone yeah v O c s and 0:16:33.360 --> 0:16:37.840 create small which is bad for your respiratory system ground 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:44.280 level baby. Um. It can also do things like if 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:47.760 you've ever seen an old building that is uh, or 0:16:47.760 --> 0:16:51.880 a monument that's got these little smooth grooves that could 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:55.160 be acid corrosion for like years and years at a 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:58.720 wear away stone. It'll it's no friend to your car 0:16:59.360 --> 0:17:01.800 paint job, that's for sure, which I mean if you're 0:17:01.800 --> 0:17:04.560 into your car, it's a big deal. Yeah. That tree, sap, pollen, 0:17:04.720 --> 0:17:09.720 bird droppings, and acid rain are the four enemies of 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:14.119 your of your auto paint. They're considered corrosive, environmental fallout, 0:17:14.200 --> 0:17:19.960 and friend of Mako. Yeah, Micho loves that stuff. Um so. 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:25.400 Uh the idea about acid rain, consider this that stone 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:30.600 statue you're just describing. That takes a long time. A 0:17:30.640 --> 0:17:32.880 lot of orange juice rain has to fall on that 0:17:32.960 --> 0:17:38.320 thing for it to become pockmarked and weathered prematurely. Right, Um, 0:17:38.359 --> 0:17:40.879 and it's had actually plenty of time to do that 0:17:41.800 --> 0:17:45.080 build a statue where James almost you'd be like it 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:52.840 spinning image. So sorry. Um so the man you got 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:55.800 me with that just so on cool. The reason the 0:17:55.880 --> 0:17:57.880 reason it's had a long we've had a long time, 0:17:58.000 --> 0:18:00.600 or that that statue is weathered over a very long 0:18:00.640 --> 0:18:02.840 time because we've had acid rain for quite some time, 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:05.200 ever since the beginning of the industrial revolution, they think 0:18:05.320 --> 0:18:07.959 pretty much, because remember they thought it was very localized problem. 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:09.720 And the reason they thought it was local was because 0:18:09.720 --> 0:18:14.600 it had such quick rapid effects. But the acid rain, 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:16.960 I don't know who who coined the term acid fog, 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:20.919 but acid rain was coined by an Englishman named Robert 0:18:20.920 --> 0:18:25.040 Angus Smith back in eighteen seventy two. Yeah, and it 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:28.120 was the monuments that made him say, what in the 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:30.560 heck is going on here? And there weren't a lot 0:18:30.600 --> 0:18:33.440 of people back then, like I was thinking when I 0:18:33.480 --> 0:18:35.200 read this, Like, man, it would have been great if 0:18:35.720 --> 0:18:40.439 during this boom of ingenuity and industrial revolution there were 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:44.560 just as many people concerned with the impact it might have. 0:18:44.720 --> 0:18:47.359 But it just couldn't have worked that way. It's almost 0:18:47.440 --> 0:18:50.000 like they just had to do their thing and then 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:52.880 leave us to figure out how to fix it, how 0:18:52.920 --> 0:18:55.399 to clean up the mess sort of. I don't know 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:58.920 if those things to two things could have evolved simultaneous. 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:00.919 So I think you're onto some thing. I mean, maybe 0:19:00.960 --> 0:19:06.560 we wouldn't have, um, I don't know, the iPhone. Maybe 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:09.480 who knows, Maybe we would I don't know. Maybe we'd 0:19:09.520 --> 0:19:12.359 be better off, yeah, a lot better off. Maybe we 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:14.639 would have more stuff, Maybe it would have changed the 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:18.240 way of thinking rather than just get get get, you know, 0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:20.760 it would have been get. But also, how's this going 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:25.480 to affect other people? So Smith was a man alone. 0:19:26.280 --> 0:19:31.280 An early ecologists will say, yeah, it's so good for him. Man, 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:33.719 you've been coming up with some great, like off the 0:19:33.760 --> 0:19:39.159 cuff creative solutions. Well, that's not a solution. And if 0:19:39.200 --> 0:19:42.240 we had a time machine, it would be yeah, the 0:19:42.280 --> 0:20:02.040 way back machines in the shops. That's why s k 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:16.240 uh So scientists did determine UM by what the seventies 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:20.359 nineteen seventies, the acid rain was a problem, and it 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:23.959 was trans boundary, it's not just local. And so then 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:28.639 in eighty thankfully the Acid Deposition Act I said you 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:31.080 know what, we're gonna study this for ten years and 0:20:31.080 --> 0:20:33.240 we're gonna see what's going on. Ten years later in 0:20:33.280 --> 0:20:36.080 nineteen nine and they said, yep, it's a big problem. Yeah, 0:20:36.560 --> 0:20:38.639 so we need to do something about it, and they 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:43.520 did very quickly. Congress um took the already established Clean 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:48.080 Air Act and added UM sulfur dioxide and uh nitrous 0:20:48.119 --> 0:20:52.840 oxide nitrogen oxide right yeah, to the list of like 0:20:53.000 --> 0:20:59.480 most wanted reduction people materials. And this was in with 0:20:59.560 --> 0:21:03.600 the Clean Air Act and the Acid rain program. So 0:21:04.920 --> 0:21:08.320 this is when everything really starts to come into effect, right, um, 0:21:08.359 --> 0:21:12.479 and it I guess at least as far as sulfur 0:21:12.520 --> 0:21:17.560 dioxide emissions went, it was wildly successful. Compared to nineteen 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:23.119 eight levels. In two thousand ten, the the sulfur dioxide 0:21:23.119 --> 0:21:29.000 emissions have been reduced by that's good. That's astounding, dude, 0:21:29.160 --> 0:21:33.280 that is astounding because consider this, that's not from hitting this. 0:21:33.520 --> 0:21:39.200 Since that's hitting it, we already got it back down 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:44.639 to fifty seventeen years. That's amazing. And the way they 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:47.639 did that is through a cap and trade scheme. I 0:21:47.720 --> 0:21:49.760 kind of like the old cap and trade. It makes 0:21:49.760 --> 0:21:53.119 a lot of sense. Cap and trade, Josh. Basically, what 0:21:53.160 --> 0:21:55.480 they say is we're going to set a cap for 0:21:55.560 --> 0:21:59.520 how much s O two that your power plant can create. 0:22:00.160 --> 0:22:02.800 It's a limit, um, but they set the cap and 0:22:02.840 --> 0:22:04.760 they says, you know what, you've got these allowances though 0:22:05.040 --> 0:22:07.359 if you come under, you get these credits and you 0:22:07.359 --> 0:22:09.600 can actually sell those to other companies that are in need. 0:22:10.280 --> 0:22:12.120 And it just I don't know something about it makes 0:22:12.119 --> 0:22:13.959 sense to me. It makes a lot of sense. And 0:22:13.960 --> 0:22:20.359 then over time you decrease the amount that that people 0:22:20.359 --> 0:22:22.800 are allowed to admit. And when you're cutting it into 0:22:22.840 --> 0:22:28.439 these allowances, those allowances by by virtue of the scarcity 0:22:28.480 --> 0:22:32.080 of them, become more valuable. Yeah, it really incentivizes you 0:22:32.119 --> 0:22:34.480 to do something about it for your company exactly. So 0:22:34.520 --> 0:22:38.320 that worked really well for nitrous oxide or for sodium 0:22:38.480 --> 0:22:41.600 sulfur dioxide. Man, what are we even talking about here? 0:22:41.640 --> 0:22:43.760 That's why I just say s O two UM. And 0:22:44.119 --> 0:22:48.760 with nitrogen oxides, they didn't institute a cap and trade 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:51.280 until like two thousand three, so it was lagging a 0:22:51.280 --> 0:22:54.200 little bit. But it too is something of a success story. 0:22:54.240 --> 0:22:58.160 They Um they reduced it from twenty seven million tons 0:22:58.920 --> 0:23:02.600 in his sixteen point three million tons in two thousand 0:23:02.560 --> 0:23:06.760 and eight. That's pretty good. And so this has had 0:23:07.000 --> 0:23:12.480 a discernible effect on the environment. Um apparently. Uh, let's 0:23:12.520 --> 0:23:17.159 see the acidic lakes. The number of acidic lakes throughout 0:23:17.200 --> 0:23:23.000 the country have reduced dramatically. UM. There are seventy percent 0:23:23.119 --> 0:23:26.320 fewer acidic lakes and streams in Wisconsin and Michigan than 0:23:26.320 --> 0:23:30.240 there were in four UM. A third of the bodies 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:33.240 of water that were acidic in the early nineties in 0:23:33.280 --> 0:23:37.760 the Adirondacks and the Northern Appalachians are now not considered 0:23:37.760 --> 0:23:42.639 acidic at all. So there have been like huge strides 0:23:42.760 --> 0:23:45.480 made other places there have not been. And also you 0:23:45.560 --> 0:23:48.240 found this really good little kind of overview about acid 0:23:48.359 --> 0:23:51.439 rain and what happened to it by Nina Rostogi from Slate. 0:23:51.880 --> 0:23:54.320 That's whose stuff I'm quoting right now. So there have 0:23:54.400 --> 0:23:58.600 been huge strides, but there's still, like you said, originally 0:23:58.680 --> 0:24:02.520 a long way to go. Yeah. The National Acidic Precipitation 0:24:02.640 --> 0:24:08.919 Assessment Program said that, Um. Another another is what we 0:24:08.960 --> 0:24:12.879 need to hit to really restore these ecosystems. And I 0:24:12.880 --> 0:24:15.520 think we're headed there. It sounds like it. Ye like 0:24:15.880 --> 0:24:18.399 we'll check in in ten years and follow up on this. 0:24:19.680 --> 0:24:26.359 M Who am I kidding? We could do well? No, 0:24:26.440 --> 0:24:30.080 well we'll well it'll be our comeback special. Okay, whatever 0:24:30.160 --> 0:24:34.080 happened to whatever happened to acid ring? Great? Um, But Chuck, 0:24:34.119 --> 0:24:37.280 I think that this is a really valuable lesson. If 0:24:37.359 --> 0:24:45.480 you have a non polarized international initiative to take care 0:24:45.520 --> 0:24:49.879 of a problem, and you can shout down business interests 0:24:49.920 --> 0:24:51.639 and just say no, this is what you're doing and 0:24:51.640 --> 0:24:55.560 here's how you're gonna do it. Um, you can make 0:24:55.960 --> 0:24:59.000 things happen. Yeah, I guess no one was saying accid 0:24:59.080 --> 0:25:02.679 rain doesn't exist. Rain is really not bad. It was 0:25:02.680 --> 0:25:05.359 pretty much nonpolarizing except for a big business and also 0:25:05.600 --> 0:25:08.280 where any jobs lost by this cap and trade scheme? 0:25:08.920 --> 0:25:11.680 Was industry hurt by this cap and trade scheme? I 0:25:11.680 --> 0:25:14.320 would wage, You're probably not. Do you think I would 0:25:14.320 --> 0:25:16.639 wage or not? But they're still in business. They're just 0:25:16.680 --> 0:25:19.920 doing it with clean coal and wet scrubbers and yeah, 0:25:20.600 --> 0:25:23.520 all that all that good stuff. Yeah, it's interesting. And 0:25:23.560 --> 0:25:26.480 I'm not even an environmentalist. I hate the environment. I'm 0:25:26.520 --> 0:25:30.119 just fascinated by this stuff. That's not true. Well, if 0:25:30.119 --> 0:25:33.439 you want to learn more about acid rain or acid fog, 0:25:33.520 --> 0:25:35.560 you can type either of those words into the search 0:25:35.600 --> 0:25:37.760 bar at how stuff works dot com and that will 0:25:37.800 --> 0:25:41.000 bring up this very interesting article by Sarah Dowdy. And uh, 0:25:41.040 --> 0:25:44.240 I said, um, acid fog, which means it's time for 0:25:44.480 --> 0:25:50.480 listener mail. I'm gonna call this m I T nerd alert. 0:25:51.400 --> 0:25:53.240 I got a very nerdy email from an m I T. 0:25:53.880 --> 0:25:56.040 Student and I teased her and said, I'm gonna read 0:25:56.080 --> 0:25:57.359 this on the air and make fun of you. Is 0:25:57.400 --> 0:25:59.040 that okay? And she went, oh yeah, and here's some 0:25:59.080 --> 0:26:00.560 other stuff you can make for what I mean about 0:26:01.480 --> 0:26:03.960