Rain Nitrates

Introduction: In the northwestern areas of Washington sunshine is a rather rare occurrence. Approximately nine months out of the year the sky is full of gigantic grey clouds filled with rainwater. During those nine months there's usually a relatively constant amount rainfall covering Bothell. Many citizens who have been experiencing the phenomena of rain for countless years are unaware that there's a difference in rainwater from previous decades. The pH of rainwater has been slowly decreasing (becoming more acidic) due to pollutants in the air. Industrial areas that are releasing nitrates (NO3-) and sulfates (SO42-) are experiencing rain with a much lower pH than usual. Some of those areas in the world have rain around pH 4 which is considerably …show more content…
Therefore, scientist have concluded that nitrates and sulfates are the main chemicals that are causing acid rain (J. Satyanarayana et al., 2010). Nitrates have been observed to appear in rainwater with higher concentrations during the winter which is mainly due to the vast majority of citizens that use heaters in their homes to keep warm. The atmosphere is composed of around 70% nitrogen. A majority of nitrates in the atmosphere are formed by oxidation reactions of NO2 and NO which mostly appeared from the daily use of fossil fuels. The ongoing combustion of fossil fuels produce nitric acid (HNO3) which eventually reaches the aqueous phase and gets mixed in with the precipitation causing the overall pH to slowly decrease (J. Kieber et al., 2005). A decrease in rainwater pH has negative effects on the environment. Rain covers the Earth's surface affecting everything on in. An experiment on bean plants showed that acidic rain has several impacts on plant behavior and function. Plants that were exposed to acidic rain demonstrate a decrease in growth rate. The bean plants displayed reduced