Acid rain, that '70s scourge, comes back

[applegrove]

Acid rain, that ’70s scourge, comes backAfter 32 years, trout breed naturally again in the Adirondacks. But the comeback may not last thanks to Trump

By Sarah Okeson at Salon

https://www.salon.com/2019/10/28/acid-rain-that-70s-scourge-comes-back_partner/

"SNIP....

Starting in the 1970s acid rain turned hundreds of lakes and streams in Adirondack Park in upstate New York so acidic that fish could not survive. Acid rain can be so toxic that it etches paint off cars.

The good news: some naturally reproducing trout were recently found in one body of water in the Adirondacks. Lake Colden had been without such naturally grown fish for 32 years. This revival comes after decades of government work to reduce the toxic air emissions that cause acid rain.

The bad news: Team Trump seems determined to create a comeback for acid rain. That would mean 500 other Adirondack ponds and lakes would continue without naturally breeding fish. Worse, some of the sprawling park’s 2,300 other bodies of water might also become too toxic for other wildlife such as crayfish, salamanders and frogs. And because acid rain leaches aluminum in the soil it also kills trees.

For people in the Northeast, it would also mean more asthma and heart disease as people breathe in air laced with greater amounts of sulfur dioxide, a toxic gas that causes acid rain.

.....SNIP"

[mahatmakanejeeves]

1. Is acid rain back, or is it the case that

"Team Trump seems determined to create a comeback for acid rain?" That's something else entirely. My question is directed at the story's author.

I thought acid rain in the east came from coal-burning plants in the midwest. Are new ones opening?

[applegrove]

2. The acidic numbers are rising. Who knows where the tipping point is.

[progree]

3. In the article, all the examples were of coal-fired power plants in the central U.S.

They talked about "the Trump EPA wants to squash Obama era rules that would force owners of this and other power plants to clean up their toxic wastes". But the acid rain problem was largely solved (or at least diminished to the point where it's out of the headlines) before Obama, so yeah, it's confusing. I'm sure coal-fired power generation has been, and is, on net, decreasing.

They show two maps of the acid rain problem ("annual mean wet sulfate deposition" ): 1989-1991 vs. 2007-2009, where 2007-2009 is far better-looking that 1989-1991.

By the way, this is a great example of cap-and-trade working.

Then the article concludes with this paragraph:

When power plants in the heartland burn coal laced with sulfur the toxic waste goes up smokestacks. Prevailing winds that tend to blow eastward then carry pollution from these coal-burning power plants to the Northeast where much of it falls in rain that kills. Team Trump not only thinks that is fine, it wants more acid rain.

So they are agreeing with what you are saying - it's from coal-fired power plants in the Central U.S. But they don't explain how rolling back the Obama-era regulations would bring back acid-rain, particularly with coal-burning declining.