Acid Rain : It’s Raining and its Soaring
Acid rain is one of the biggest threat to our soil, forests, aquatic animals and historical monuments. Some people might not know about Acid Rain. What is Acid Rain? When the amount of acid level in rain water increases causing rain water to be more acidic in nature. Normal rain water have a slightly acidic nature and have a pH ranging between 5.3 and 7, When the pH value of the rain water goes below 5.3 then it becomes acid water.
How Acid Rain is formed? Air consists of a lot of gases including Oxygen, Nitrogen, CO2 and more. When the amount of Nitrogen Oxides(NOx), Carbon Dioxide(CO2) and Sulphur Oxides (SO2) increases in the air and comes in contact with water then Nitric Acid , Carbonic acid and Sulphuric acid are formed. These acids increases the acidic nature of water and causes acid rain.
Effects of Acid Rain? Acid Rain not only decays Environment’s health but also living organism’s health. The acidic water causes harm to living beings, nature and man made architectures. Following are some of its effects:
Aquatic Environment and animals : Acid rain water ultimately falls into rivers, lakes and sea and lowers its pH value causing it more acidic. Aquatic animals and plants need a pH level of 4.8 or above and if the pH value falls below 4.8 most of the living aquatic organisms / plants face problems and fights for their survival. Some of the aquatic organisms species have been completely vanished and some of them are no the edge of getting vanished.
Soil and Forests: Acid decreases the fertility of soil and resulting in decrease in nourishment of chemical compounds forming soil. It also decreases the biological activities of small organisms and plants resulting in the breakage of food chain.
Human made Architectures, buildings and historical monuments : Acid tends to decay buildings and monuments specially if made with limestone. A chemical reaction takes place between limestone and acid water and corrodes the layer away. Acid rain is taking away the beauty of our world. One of the greatest example is Taj Mahal, a world’s wonder made limestone is greatly corroding away with acid rain.
Health : Acid rain is a result of sulphur and nitrogen oxides and their chemical reactions with oxygen, water and other gases present in the air. These harmful gases not only cause acid rain but have other harmful effects. These gases when inhaled by a living person or animal may cause severe health problems including lung and heart diseases.
Who is responsible? A lot of things are responsible for acid rain including industrialisation, overuse of natural resources, catalysed natural process and more.
Industrialisation and overuse of natural resources : We all know that our mother Earth have limited natural resources. Overconsumption of these natural resources causes increase in pollution(Air, water, soil and more) containing harmful oxides of nitrogen, carbon and sulphur. Coal burning releases a huge amount of sulphur and nitrogen gases and when these oxides comes in contact with oxygen and water then Ammonium nitrate, sulphuric acid and nitric acids are formed.
Volcanoes : One of the biggest source of causing acid rain is volcanic emissions. During emissions it produces a large amount of gases including Carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides and sulphur oxides causing the air around volcanoes to be more acidic in nature. When rain water comes in contact with these gases followed by chemical reactions and acid rain is formed.
What should we do? There are a couple of thing if we do can reduce the frequency and amount of acid rain.
Energy Resources : Do not always go for coal or natural gases to keep power supply running. Always try to find the alternatives because consumption of natural resources is one of the biggest reason for acid rain. You may have solar panels to have electricity instead of using the conventional ways.
Do not throw garbage to water : Throwing away garbage specially into water may result in engineering the aquatic animals species and production of acids inside water. This water would evaporate containing oxides of sulphur,carbon and nitrogen and fall down as acid rain. Try to keep your water around rivers, lakes and sea as clean as possible.
Take Initiatives : Everybody should take part in cleaning up the mess that we have caused to our environment by planting more trees, cleaning up the streets and water, promoting green energy resources and more. Start taking initiatives for other and soon everybody will follow you.
Image Credits
"The Greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it"
-Robert Swan
Data Collected from following Sources:
Impacts of Acid Rain and Deposition
Support Me by Upvoting and Resteemimg to reach more people
I like it!
Thank you for reading :)