WEBVTT - Whatever happened to acid rain? 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:02.920 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. 0:00:03.160 --> 0:00:07.520 It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you should know 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:16.239 from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to 0:00:16.239 --> 0:00:19.599 the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, that's Charles W. Chuck Bryant, 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:22.919 and we're doing this again. We're bringing the science this 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:30.480 time for once in our lives. Acid Rain, Yeah, boarding 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:34.400 down from the acid clouds. That's not how that song goes. 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:37.880 That's not how acid rain by Dejoon Daego. That guy 0:00:38.040 --> 0:00:39.760 so great. We watched that again the other day just 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:42.519 by a chance, and I hadn't seen it in a 0:00:42.560 --> 0:00:45.519 couple of years, and it's still just he's hard to like, 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:47.720 Chad said our friend, it's hard to believe that that's 0:00:47.800 --> 0:00:50.519 voice comes out of that guy. And he's kind a 0:00:50.520 --> 0:00:54.480 new one, like mother Economy really good. Yeah, yeah, he's 0:00:54.480 --> 0:00:57.760 a good guy. Um. I don't know what chocolate Rains about, 0:00:57.840 --> 0:01:01.040 but there's a good call out. I would be very 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:04.959 interested to hear everyone's interpretation of what chocolate rain means 0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:12.920 that too. Um, let's see, Chuck, do you remember back 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:21.080 in the eighties hearing about two things too terrifying environmental things. 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:26.880 One the Ozone layer, specifically the whole in the ozone layer, 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:32.160 and two acid rain, you throw an apartheid and that 0:01:32.280 --> 0:01:37.600 is the eighties. Yeah, I'm not gonna play sen City nope. Um, yeah, 0:01:37.640 --> 0:01:41.560 that's pretty much. Also, don't forget cocaine, Ronald Reagan, jelly 0:01:41.600 --> 0:01:47.640 Beans and the team and Magnum. But he kind of 0:01:47.640 --> 0:01:49.880 transcends the eighties. Really, if you ask me, he's just 0:01:50.320 --> 0:01:55.120 a man of all times, never gets old. Um. The 0:01:55.160 --> 0:01:58.040 weird thing is this, since I guess maybe the mid 0:01:58.160 --> 0:02:00.440 nineties or whatever, you don't hear about any of those 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:05.080 things except for Magnum any longer. Yeah, because of course 0:02:05.160 --> 0:02:08.239 global warming took over and everyone's afraid we're gonna melt now, 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:10.480 and so they said, well, we don't need to worry 0:02:10.480 --> 0:02:12.560 about acid rain anymore. We fix that problem. Right. I 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:15.160 think there's a perception that, you know, acid rain was 0:02:15.240 --> 0:02:19.040 fixed and taken care of, and astoundingly in a lot 0:02:19.080 --> 0:02:22.560 of ways, it has been. Yeah, they've come a long way, baby. 0:02:22.800 --> 0:02:24.880 Those Onlaer, by the way, has not been. As a 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:27.119 matter of fact, another one opened up in the Antarctic. 0:02:27.200 --> 0:02:31.080 Now we have two. But that's a that's another topic 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:33.840 of discussion. Acid rain let's get back to it though. 0:02:34.000 --> 0:02:36.519 Is a very Uh. It's a nice success story in 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:39.640 a lot of ways. And it came from a comprehensive 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:45.200 understanding of a problem and a comprehensive will to address it. 0:02:45.600 --> 0:02:48.639 That's right, that's how you take care of stuff. There 0:02:48.720 --> 0:02:51.600 is still a long way to go, though, I was 0:02:51.880 --> 0:02:54.440 bringing me back down earth. Not completely fixed, but it 0:02:54.520 --> 0:02:56.959 is good. It's heartwarming to know that you can see 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:02.720 a problem and and reduce something like acid rain precisely, so, Chuck, 0:03:02.800 --> 0:03:07.720 what is acid rain? Acid rain, Josh, is a transboundary issue, 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:11.920 which means even though it just occurs in the mainly 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:14.720 occurs in the Northern Hemisphere, it still is going to 0:03:14.960 --> 0:03:17.400 cross over and affect the rest of the world. And 0:03:17.440 --> 0:03:20.440 the reason that's worth mentioning is because for many years, 0:03:20.520 --> 0:03:24.200 up until the nighties, um, they thought it was a 0:03:24.280 --> 0:03:27.960 very local problem. Uh, and then they realized, oh no, 0:03:28.200 --> 0:03:30.560 it's not, and everybody kind of got on board with 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:33.720 fixing it. That's ry Um. But like you said, Northern Hemisphere, 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:38.760 it occurs mostly there because we're the dirtiest, more industrial, 0:03:39.040 --> 0:03:43.800 most polluting. Yeah. So specifically, what it is, um is 0:03:45.000 --> 0:03:49.920 rain with acid in it. Literally, Uh, emissions of sulfur dioxide, 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:54.040 s O two, nitrogen oxides and O X from things 0:03:54.120 --> 0:03:57.200 like cars and factories, power plants, all those nasty things, 0:03:57.320 --> 0:04:02.360 Lightning strikes, volcanoes, the natural ones. Um. They will actually 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:07.240 react with water vapor in the atmosphere and turn into acid, 0:04:07.280 --> 0:04:10.920 sulfuric and nitric acids, and they can fall in the 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:15.400 form of wet rain, um, snow, sleep, bog or they 0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:21.599 can be deposited as particulates and gases. That's dry acid rain. Well, 0:04:21.680 --> 0:04:24.960 the whole dry things called acid depositions because it can 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:28.760 be wet or dry, right, and it's being deposited exactly 0:04:28.800 --> 0:04:31.640 on the earth. Yeah, that's what that word is. It's 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:34.279 branched from deposit, isn't it. I think so, Yeah, it 0:04:34.320 --> 0:04:37.840 didn't even occur to me. Um and so you so 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:43.200 bravo unexplaining acid rain, and bravo Sarah Dowdy who wrote this. Yeah, 0:04:43.240 --> 0:04:45.720 she did a very good job on this. UM. And 0:04:46.000 --> 0:04:48.920 when you can't just be like, well this this rain 0:04:48.960 --> 0:04:51.360 seems a little hanky, So we're gonna say that that's 0:04:51.400 --> 0:04:55.080 acid rain. They actually know. Um, there's a there's a 0:04:55.160 --> 0:05:00.200 very um strict definition of what constitutes acid rain. And 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:02.560 then they use the pH scale to determine it. Good 0:05:02.600 --> 0:05:05.600 old pH scale. So the pH scale is um this 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:10.960 spectrum between highly acidic and highly basic, right and um. 0:05:11.040 --> 0:05:14.719 Acid rain obviously falls towards the acidic side of the scale, 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:17.920 and in the middle of this scale is pure water. 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:21.280 And that's at a seven point. Oh, it's not at zero. 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:24.599 It's entirely neutral. It's neither basic nor acidic. Yeah. I 0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:27.559 just find it interesting that it's a scale of zero 0:05:27.600 --> 0:05:30.680 to fourteen with seven being in the middle. Seven's in 0:05:30.720 --> 0:05:32.800 the middle of zero to fourteen. Yeah, but I mean 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:36.120 it just for me, I would say zero is neutral 0:05:36.320 --> 0:05:39.839 and anything above would be negative. But whatever. In the 0:05:39.880 --> 0:05:43.720 grand tradition of Um civilization established by the Romans, though, 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.679 the pH scale starts at one rather than zero. Um. 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:51.600 But yeah, I see what you're saying. Actually here, I 0:05:51.680 --> 0:05:54.160 like the fact I think it goes from one to fourteen. Well, 0:05:54.160 --> 0:05:58.040 then Sarah got it wrong. Um, in the the graph 0:05:58.160 --> 0:06:02.559 here says one to fourteen. I wonder, um, but back 0:06:02.560 --> 0:06:10.320 to its seventh in the middle either way, seven, Yeah, 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.800 so it would start a zero. I guess. Um. So 0:06:14.760 --> 0:06:18.000 the more acidic is the lower numbers, and the more 0:06:18.040 --> 0:06:21.480 basic is the higher numbers. Right. The thing is is 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:26.039 rain isn't neutral. Normal rain still is slightly acidic, and 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:30.600 it hits about five point six on the pH scale. Right, 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:35.280 Um so why well, it combines with carbon dioxide in 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:41.159 the atmosphere to form a slightly acidic um carbonic acid deposition, 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:46.279 which is branch from the root word deposit um. So 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:50.080 uh so acid rain is something like five point three 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:54.560 to four point oh as far as um acidity goes, right, 0:06:54.680 --> 0:06:58.719 four point three to five okay, Um, yeah, that's a 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:03.240 big difference. Um, And it's something like what the acidity 0:07:03.880 --> 0:07:07.320 between orange juice and black coffee? Yeah, which Sarah is 0:07:07.400 --> 0:07:09.960 keen to point out, which is a bit of a misnomer. 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:11.840 While that's true, you can't say, well, like well it's 0:07:11.880 --> 0:07:13.600 just like coffee and then you're like that's not gonna 0:07:13.880 --> 0:07:15.880 still coffe in your grass and it's not gonna kill it. 0:07:16.240 --> 0:07:20.120 See I'm and yeah, my hat was off to her 0:07:20.200 --> 0:07:22.120 for saying, like what what what? We don't just be 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.720 like orange juice is fine, coffee is fine, because if 0:07:24.720 --> 0:07:26.560 you think about it, if a rained orange juice all 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:29.440 the time, you'd probably have the same impact. Would be 0:07:29.520 --> 0:07:32.160 awesome about just like all the old cup out the 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:37.720 window each morning, I'd be like, oh, it's with pulp today. Um. 0:07:37.800 --> 0:07:40.800 The problem with acid rain though, Josh, even though it 0:07:40.960 --> 0:07:45.240 is has the acidity of a coffee or an orange juice, 0:07:45.800 --> 0:07:49.120 it um can wreck small parts of an ecosystem. And 0:07:49.160 --> 0:07:51.760 as we all know, if you wreck small parts of 0:07:51.760 --> 0:07:55.080 an ecosystem, there's a domino effect that occurs that spreads 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:58.760 throughout an ecosystem. One of the most valuable things on 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:02.800 the planet is something like plankton. Yeah, plankton is high currents. 0:08:02.920 --> 0:08:05.320 It's like honey buns in prison, but for the yeah, 0:08:05.520 --> 0:08:08.000 you know pretty much. And when plankton, which is very 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:12.800 very sensitive to changes in pH um, especially when it 0:08:12.920 --> 0:08:18.320 becomes more acidic, when plankton dies and small invertebrates die, 0:08:18.680 --> 0:08:22.920 then yeah, it starves out the larger animals, fish and frogs, 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:26.480 and then we start to get hungry, especially the French 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:29.880 we frog legs e g. Acid rain is a huge 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:34.000 problem in France, that's right, And eventually it's just mass hysteria. 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:38.160 Pretty much got some dogs living together kimberally from different 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:40.960 strokes and up with green hair. That's right. Uh. There 0:08:40.960 --> 0:08:44.200 are a couple of UM programs UM that monitor this 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:48.760 UH in the US, the National Atmospheric Deposition Program and 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:52.240 they handled the wet deposition and the Clean Air Status 0:08:52.280 --> 0:08:55.440 and Trends Network. UM handled the dry And what they're 0:08:55.480 --> 0:08:59.040 looking for is trying to determine the critical load, which 0:08:59.080 --> 0:09:04.160 is how much an ecosystem can UM take before it 0:09:04.240 --> 0:09:08.240 starts saying, man, I'm breaking down. You're killing me with 0:09:08.280 --> 0:09:13.240 this stuff. UM. And the pH scale is determined by 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:17.760 UH the concentration of hydrogen ions right in a substance. 0:09:17.800 --> 0:09:21.400 That's what makes it either UM acidic or basic. Right. 0:09:21.880 --> 0:09:25.479 So what these programs are doing is measuring the concentration 0:09:25.520 --> 0:09:30.000 of hydrogen ions to determine acidity. And they say, oh, well, 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:33.760 this is this is too much science. I would just 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:36.280 walk out and be like, look at this. This plankton 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:39.160 is not looking very healthy. This is acidic. I don't 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.720 even need to measure this stuff. You can just spot 0:09:41.880 --> 0:09:44.920 unhappy plankton pretty much. It's not how you Once you 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:47.439 know what to look for, I'll teach you sometimes it's 0:09:47.480 --> 0:09:50.199 not hard. When you've met happy plankton, your life will 0:09:50.200 --> 0:09:53.200 never be the same. The difference is like night and day. 0:09:53.640 --> 0:10:00.040 So UM surface waters are where acid rain is to 0:10:00.160 --> 0:10:04.040 hit you most initially, um, precipitation, and you don't really 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:05.880 think about this. You think it, well, it rains in 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:08.120 a lake, what in a and in a river. What 0:10:08.200 --> 0:10:11.000 it does is it rains on the ground. And although 0:10:11.520 --> 0:10:13.560 sure it rains on the water surface, it's also going 0:10:13.600 --> 0:10:17.319 to run through soil to get to water. Right. One 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:19.800 of the purposes of soil. One of the functions that 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:25.840 provides is um buffering uh water that percolates through it 0:10:25.960 --> 0:10:30.480 toward groundwater, towards bodies of water. And what's buffering me? Well, 0:10:30.600 --> 0:10:36.000 it has the ability to neutralize acids. Yeah, and then awesome, yeah, um, 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:39.520 I think it brings everything more toward purified water or 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:45.080 neutral pH right. Yeah, but I think specifically with a 0:10:45.120 --> 0:10:47.800 lot of like the um, the minerals that are in 0:10:47.840 --> 0:10:52.840 the soil, like say calcium, they counteract acidic um rain 0:10:53.320 --> 0:10:57.000 acidic water to bring it more toward neutral right. The 0:10:57.040 --> 0:11:00.520 problem is is when the soil's buffering capacity is a reloaded, 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:03.440 there's just too much for it to handle. A lot 0:11:03.480 --> 0:11:07.120 of that unneutralized acid gets passed along into the body 0:11:07.160 --> 0:11:09.360 of water, and then you start to have those big 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:12.840 problems with the little unhappy plankton. Yeah, it's almost like 0:11:12.880 --> 0:11:17.120 a water filter that's past its date. You know, it 0:11:17.200 --> 0:11:20.480 just can't filter anymore. Nice analogy, thank you. UM. So 0:11:20.559 --> 0:11:23.520 we've talked about what happens where the French end up 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:27.560 with a lot of big problems in UM coastal areas. 0:11:28.200 --> 0:11:33.000 Uh nitrogen, Remember we have UM what is it sulfuric 0:11:33.040 --> 0:11:39.400 acid and what acid? Yeah, nitric acid. Okay, So nitric 0:11:39.440 --> 0:11:43.000 acid is based on nitrogen. Nitrogen has a really interesting 0:11:43.040 --> 0:11:48.560 impact on coastal waters where when it's deposited UM, it 0:11:48.640 --> 0:11:54.679 supports algae blooms because algae love nitrogen. And when algae 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:58.800 blooms take place, algae starts to die eventually, and they 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:05.240 sustained bacteria, specifically aerobic bacteria that flourishes itself and sucks 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:09.800 up all the oxygen in the water, starving fish, shellfish, 0:12:10.040 --> 0:12:14.719 um plants, and eventually like leading to at the very 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:17.800 least a strain, if not a collapse on coastal ecosystem. 0:12:18.000 --> 0:12:23.080 So too much acid rain will increase algae. Increased algae 0:12:23.080 --> 0:12:26.600 means increased dyeing algae, and increased dyeing algae means increased 0:12:26.600 --> 0:12:32.720 bacteria and they rob fishes of their oxygen. That's a 0:12:32.760 --> 0:12:34.920 domino effect. One of the things I love about acid 0:12:35.000 --> 0:12:39.160 rain is just how elegantly understandable it is. It is 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:44.680 very basic and simple. I love it. It's not basic acidic. Um. 0:12:44.840 --> 0:12:47.160 So this we're not done with the soil too, by 0:12:47.200 --> 0:12:51.640 the way, in a in an addition to UM, I 0:12:52.000 --> 0:12:57.680 guess decreasing its buffering capacity or overloading its buffering capacity. Um. 0:12:58.800 --> 0:13:04.400 Acid rain has the terrible habit of drawing aluminum out 0:13:04.400 --> 0:13:07.040 of the soil. Yeah, it's normally locked in the soil. 0:13:07.480 --> 0:13:09.920 Acid rain draws it out, which means that tree roots 0:13:09.960 --> 0:13:12.880 can suck it up, and that's poison to them. That's 0:13:12.880 --> 0:13:16.959 a toxin. Yeah. And Sarah makes a good point here. 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:20.240 It's not like a it's not a situation where you're 0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:22.880 gonna find a rainforest is leveled all of a sudden 0:13:23.160 --> 0:13:26.200 because of acid rain, or you're gonna find a lake 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:30.600 or a river that looks nasty and decaying and disgusting 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:34.520 water might actually look cleaner. Yeah. And then ironic it is. 0:13:34.720 --> 0:13:37.880 It's ironic and beautiful. And um, what it's gonna do 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:41.120 to your forest is it's gonna stunt its growth and 0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:45.120 over time it's gonna have an effect. Yeah, like you're 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:51.800 gonna have bald trees. Um. Because in addition to this, 0:13:52.240 --> 0:13:54.840 toxins coming out in the soil on low lying areas 0:13:54.920 --> 0:14:00.000 from acid rain um, and it also degrading helpful minerals 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:02.120 like we said, like calcium and other things that trees 0:14:02.160 --> 0:14:08.400 also used. Um. In higher elevations, that acid rain turns 0:14:08.480 --> 0:14:11.280 into an acid fog. That is a did that's crazy 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:13.320 to me that that I'm going to say at this 0:14:13.400 --> 0:14:18.439 time that is a great band name acid yeah. Uh. 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:21.120 But so just imagine like trees bathing in that all 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:24.920 the time, um, that that strips their leaves and basically 0:14:25.160 --> 0:14:28.600 makes them chili. Yeah. And that's why when you see 0:14:29.040 --> 0:14:33.880 mountains in the Appalachian Mountains that have bald peaks, it's 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:37.120 not because trees can't grow up there. They could grow 0:14:37.200 --> 0:14:40.400 up there if they weren't sucking in and being surrounded 0:14:40.400 --> 0:14:45.040 by acid clouds. That's nuts. Just it doesn't you have 0:14:45.080 --> 0:14:47.760 to be raining, right, yeah, you know, it's just in 0:14:48.000 --> 0:14:51.800 particulates in the air. Uh. And that that kind of 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:56.520 leads to how it affects us because we are not 0:14:56.720 --> 0:15:01.040 nearly as sensitive to these kind of changes um with 0:15:01.120 --> 0:15:03.680 acid that that acid rain brings. Right now, it's not 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:06.720 gonna burn. You know, you can swim in a lake, uh, 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:10.600 an acid lake and you will be fine. Um, but 0:15:11.240 --> 0:15:14.760 an acidic lake, let's say, and yeah, because it's just 0:15:14.800 --> 0:15:17.840 above battery acid. So you couldn't swim in a battery 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:21.480 acid like that. That's terrible. Um, But you could swim 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:25.640 in an acidic lake as far as acid rains concerned. Um, 0:15:25.680 --> 0:15:31.440 the problem comes with that dry deposition. The UM sulfuric 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:37.160 and nitric ox or nitric acids combine UH in low 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:45.080 lying areas with ozone yeah, VOCs and create small which 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:50.800 is bad for your respiratory system ground level baby. Um. 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:54.600 It can also do things like if you've ever seen 0:15:54.640 --> 0:15:58.440 an old building that is UH, or a monument that's 0:15:58.480 --> 0:16:02.880 got these little smooth grooves that could be acid corrosion 0:16:03.320 --> 0:16:05.880 for like years and years to wear away stone. It'll 0:16:06.600 --> 0:16:10.280 It's no friend to your car paint job, that's sure, 0:16:10.480 --> 0:16:12.320 which I mean if you're into your car, it's a 0:16:12.320 --> 0:16:16.200 big deal. Yeah. That tree, sap, pollen, bird droppings, and 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:20.640 acid rain are the four enemies of your of your 0:16:20.720 --> 0:16:26.280 auto paint. They're considered corrosive, environmental fallout, and friend of Mako. Yeah, 0:16:26.400 --> 0:16:32.640 Micho loves that stuff. Um so, uh, the idea about 0:16:32.680 --> 0:16:37.359 acid rain, consider this that stone statue you're just describing. 0:16:38.400 --> 0:16:41.320 That takes a long time. A lot of orange juice 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:43.640 rain has to fall on that thing for it to 0:16:43.680 --> 0:16:48.400 become pock marked and weathered prematurely, right, Um, and it's 0:16:48.440 --> 0:16:51.560 had actually plenty of time to do that. What the 0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:56.120 statue of Edward James almost you'd be like spinning image. 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:03.000 So sorry, um so the man you got me with that? 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:06.480 So cool? The reason the reason it's had a long 0:17:06.600 --> 0:17:09.000 we've had a long time, or that that statue was 0:17:09.320 --> 0:17:11.680 weathered over very long times because we've had acid rain 0:17:11.720 --> 0:17:13.600 for quite some time, ever since the beginning of the 0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:16.320 Industrial Revolution, they think pretty much because remember they thought 0:17:16.320 --> 0:17:18.400 it was very localized problem. And the reason they thought 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:22.320 it was local was because it had such quick rapid effects. 0:17:23.200 --> 0:17:25.639 But the acid rain, I don't know who who coined 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:29.240 the term acid fog, but acid rain was coined by 0:17:29.320 --> 0:17:34.200 an Englishman named Robert Angus Smith back in eighteen seventy two. Yeah, 0:17:34.560 --> 0:17:37.119 and it was the monuments that made him say, what 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.080 in the heck is going on here? And there weren't 0:17:40.080 --> 0:17:42.920 a lot of people back then, like I was thinking 0:17:42.920 --> 0:17:44.399 when I read this like, man, it would have been 0:17:44.400 --> 0:17:49.080 great if during this boom of ingenuity and industrial revolution 0:17:49.600 --> 0:17:53.760 there were just as many people concerned with the impact 0:17:53.800 --> 0:17:56.440 it might have. But it just couldn't have worked that way. 0:17:56.520 --> 0:17:59.200 It's almost like they just had to do their thing 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:02.359 and then leave us to figure out how to fix it, 0:18:02.440 --> 0:18:05.000 how to clean up the mess sort of. I don't 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:07.399 know if those things to two things could have evolved. 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:10.760 So I think you're onto something. I mean, maybe we 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:17.320 wouldn't have um, I don't know, the iPhone. Maybe, who knows, 0:18:17.440 --> 0:18:20.800 Maybe we would I don't know. Maybe we'd be better off, yeah, 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:23.040 a lot better off. Maybe we would have more stuff. 0:18:23.040 --> 0:18:25.600 Maybe it would have changed the way of thinking rather 0:18:25.680 --> 0:18:28.439 than just get get get, you know, it would have 0:18:28.440 --> 0:18:31.560 been get. But also, how's this going to affect other people? 0:18:32.040 --> 0:18:39.560 So Smith was a man alone. An early ecologist will say, yeah, 0:18:39.640 --> 0:18:41.919 it's so good for him. Man, you've been coming up 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:47.520 with some great, like off the cuff, creative solutions. Well, 0:18:47.560 --> 0:18:49.680 that's not a solution. If we had a time machine, 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:52.720 it would be okay, Yeah, the way back machines in 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:59.080 the shops. Uh. So scientists did determine um by what 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:03.680 the seventies nineteen seventies that acid rain was a problem, 0:19:03.760 --> 0:19:07.399 and it was transboundary, it's not just local. And so 0:19:07.480 --> 0:19:12.160 then in night thankfully the Acid Deposition Act, I said 0:19:12.200 --> 0:19:13.800 you know what, we're gonna study this for ten years 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:16.800 and we're gonna see what's going on ten years later 0:19:16.800 --> 0:19:19.680 in nineteen nine and they said, yep, that's a big problem. Yea, 0:19:20.200 --> 0:19:22.280 So we need to do something about it, and they 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:27.160 did very quickly. Congress um took the already established Clean 0:19:27.200 --> 0:19:32.280 Air Act and added UM sulfur dioxide and UH nitrous oxide, 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:37.400 nitrogen oxide right to the list of like most wanted 0:19:37.800 --> 0:19:43.600 reduction people materials. And this was in with the Clean 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:48.760 Air Act and the Acid Rain program. So this is 0:19:48.800 --> 0:19:51.880 when everything really starts to come into effect, right UM. 0:19:52.000 --> 0:19:56.119 And it I guess at least as far as sulfur 0:19:56.160 --> 0:20:01.000 dioxide emissions went, it was wildly successful. Compared to nine 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:06.760 eight levels in two thousand ten. The the sulfur dioxide 0:20:06.760 --> 0:20:12.800 emissions have been reduced by that's good. That's astounding. That 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:16.920 is astounding because consider this, that's not from hitting this. 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:22.919 Since that's hitting we already got it back down to 0:20:26.000 --> 0:20:28.720 seventeen years. That's amazing. And the way they did that 0:20:29.200 --> 0:20:31.600 is through a cap and trade scheme. I kind of 0:20:31.640 --> 0:20:33.680 like the old cap and trade. It makes a lot 0:20:33.720 --> 0:20:37.160 of sense cap and trade, Josh. Basically what they say 0:20:37.280 --> 0:20:40.240 is we're gonna set a cap for how much s 0:20:40.280 --> 0:20:45.399 O two that your power plant can create. It's a limit, um, 0:20:45.440 --> 0:20:47.080 but they set the cap, and they says, you know what, 0:20:47.080 --> 0:20:49.919 you've got these allowances though, if you come under, you 0:20:50.000 --> 0:20:51.879 get these credits and you can actually sell those to 0:20:51.960 --> 0:20:54.600 other companies that are in need. And it just I 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:56.199 don't know, so I'm about it makes sense to me. 0:20:56.359 --> 0:20:58.879 It makes a lot of sense. And then over time 0:20:59.320 --> 0:21:04.840 you decrease the amount that that people are allowed to admit, 0:21:05.359 --> 0:21:08.120 and when you're cutting it into these allowances, those allowances, 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:14.520 by by virtue of the scarcity of them, become more valuable. Yeah, 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:16.840 it really incentivizes you to do something about it for 0:21:16.920 --> 0:21:19.320 your company exactly. So that worked really well for nitrous 0:21:19.359 --> 0:21:24.119 oxide or for sodium sulfur dioxide. Man, what are we 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:30.760 even talking about here, um, And with nitrogen oxides, they 0:21:30.880 --> 0:21:33.760 didn't institute a cap and trade until like two thousand three, 0:21:33.920 --> 0:21:36.320 so it was lagging a little bit, but it too 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:39.880 is something of a success story. They um, they reduced 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:43.639 it from twenty seven million tons in nineteen eighty to 0:21:43.800 --> 0:21:46.480 sixteen point three million tons in two thousand and eight. 0:21:47.280 --> 0:21:51.520 That's pretty good. And so this has had a discernible 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:58.120 effect on the environment. UM. Apparently, Uh, let's see the 0:21:58.160 --> 0:22:01.760 acidic likes. The number of acidic lakes throughout the country 0:22:02.600 --> 0:22:07.960 have reduced dramatically. UM. There are seventy fewer acidic lakes 0:22:07.960 --> 0:22:12.360 and streams in Wisconsin and Michigan than there were in UM. 0:22:12.480 --> 0:22:15.600 A third of the bodies of water that were acidic 0:22:15.640 --> 0:22:18.480 in the early nineties in the Adirondacks and the Northern 0:22:18.480 --> 0:22:23.400 Appalachians are now not considered acidic at all. So there 0:22:23.400 --> 0:22:27.919 have been like huge strides made other places there have 0:22:28.080 --> 0:22:30.480 not been. And also you found this really good little 0:22:30.560 --> 0:22:32.840 kind of overview about acid rain and what happened to 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:36.400 it by Nina Rostogi from Slate. That's whose stuff I'm 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:39.040 quoting right now. So there have been huge strides, but 0:22:39.480 --> 0:22:43.760 there's still, like you said, originally a long way to go. Yeah. 0:22:43.840 --> 0:22:49.840 The National Acidic Precipitation Assessment Program said that. Um. Another 0:22:50.119 --> 0:22:53.960 another is what we need to hit to really restore 0:22:54.000 --> 0:22:58.280 these ecosystems, And I think we're headed there. It sounds 0:22:58.320 --> 0:23:01.240 like it like we'll check in in ten years and 0:23:01.280 --> 0:23:07.600 follow up on this. M Who am I kidding? We could? 0:23:08.320 --> 0:23:12.400 Well no, well, well well it'll be our comeback special. 0:23:13.280 --> 0:23:17.200 Whatever happened to whatever happened to acid? Right? Great? Um, 0:23:17.240 --> 0:23:19.919 but Chuck, I think that this is a really valuable lesson. 0:23:20.720 --> 0:23:28.880 If you have a non polarized international initiative to take 0:23:28.920 --> 0:23:33.159 care of a problem, and you can shout down business 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:35.160 interests and just say no, this is what you're doing 0:23:35.200 --> 0:23:38.760 and here's how you're gonna do it. Um, you can 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:41.639 make things happen. Yeah. I guess no one was saying 0:23:42.280 --> 0:23:46.199 that should rain doesn't exist is really not bad. It 0:23:46.240 --> 0:23:49.040 was pretty much nonpolarizing except for big business. And also 0:23:49.240 --> 0:23:51.959 where any jobs lost by this cap and trade scheme? 0:23:52.560 --> 0:23:55.320 Was industry hurt by this cap and trade scheme? I 0:23:55.320 --> 0:23:58.520 would wage, you're probably not I would wage or not. 0:23:58.840 --> 0:24:00.760 But they're still in business. They're just doing it with 0:24:01.040 --> 0:24:04.720 clean coal and wet scrubbers and yeah, all that all 0:24:04.720 --> 0:24:07.760 that good stuff. Yeah, it's interesting. And I'm not even 0:24:07.760 --> 0:24:11.160 an environmentalist. I hate the environment. I'm just fascinated by 0:24:11.200 --> 0:24:14.119 this stuff that's not true. Well, if you want to 0:24:14.200 --> 0:24:17.399 learn more about acid rain or acid fog. You can 0:24:17.440 --> 0:24:19.520 type either of those words into the search bar at 0:24:19.520 --> 0:24:21.800 how stuff works dot com and that will bring up 0:24:21.840 --> 0:24:25.879 this very interesting article by Sarah Dowdy. And uh, I said, um, 0:24:26.000 --> 0:24:32.359 acid fog, which means the time for listener mail before 0:24:32.400 --> 0:24:34.600 listener mail quickly. We are going to Comic Con this 0:24:34.680 --> 0:24:39.320 year for the first time. Yeah, like we're like presenting 0:24:39.600 --> 0:24:41.800 at comic Con. We're not just going as fans. And 0:24:41.840 --> 0:24:44.679 this is the one in San Diego, the original the 0:24:44.720 --> 0:24:47.840 original comic Con that is coming up in uh what 0:24:48.040 --> 0:24:51.800 mid July? Yeah, July twelve, Yeah, San Diego ce A 0:24:52.200 --> 0:24:54.600 and I guess what do We were not quite sure 0:24:54.640 --> 0:24:56.160 when we're going, so we just want to say stay 0:24:56.200 --> 0:24:58.439 tuned for details. Yeah, but we will be there. I 0:24:58.440 --> 0:25:00.640 mean like we have flights booked in every thing, hotels, 0:25:00.680 --> 0:25:03.200 the whole stup bank. Yeah, and it may or may 0:25:03.200 --> 0:25:07.359 not our presentation may or may not include certain other 0:25:07.800 --> 0:25:10.080 I don't think we should go any further. You're gonna 0:25:10.080 --> 0:25:12.679 get us in trouble. Well, we're trying to land some 0:25:12.680 --> 0:25:17.119 some whales. Okay, I'm gonna call this m I t 0:25:17.320 --> 0:25:20.480 nerd alert. I got a very nerdy email from an M. 0:25:20.480 --> 0:25:23.080 I T student, and I teased her and said, I'm 0:25:23.080 --> 0:25:24.480 gonna read this on the air and make fun of you. 0:25:24.680 --> 0:25:26.360 Is that okay? And she went, oh yeah, And here's 0:25:26.359 --> 0:25:27.960 some other stuff you can make fun of me about. 0:25:28.880 --> 0:25:31.359