Acid Rain in South Korea

Environmental statistics reveals that the pollution of acid rain in South Korea is a serious issue. Yet the awareness of people is low. Even after a gradual decrease of pollutant emission in Korea, the acidity has not been reduced. There no boundaries in the atmosphere are set and the influence of the neighboring countries such as China is apparent. Governmental efforts among China, Japan and Korea have been made on this issue. However, not much progress has been observed. Along with the governmental activities, therefore, an active monitoring of the pollution among the countries and the promotion of environmental awareness at the civil level including especially the middle and high schools are highly recommended. It will be this young generation who will face damaged country as inheritance not the current generation.


Occurence And Distribution of Acid Rain In South Korea:

Acid rain has become a worldwide issue as environmental problem since 1980's. From the latter part of 1980's, nations regulated the emission of sulpur oxides and nitrogen oxides.Actually the release of sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides has been reduced substantially since 1990's and it appeared that the problem of acid rain was almost solved. The discharge of sulpur oxides was reduced. Nevertheless, the acidity of rain was not weakened. The reason was the reduction of alkaline materials simultaneously that neutralized the acidity of rain [3]. Alkaline dust and suspended solids were reduced as road pavement expanded. Alkaline dust became less in the air also through the efforts of reducing dust discharges that were produced from the factories and power plants. 

As a result, acid rain appears still strong in 2011 in South Korea. Rather, public attention decreased than before. It seems that acid rain is not a top priority any more due to other environmental issues. In order to achieve more substantial results, a couple of  obligatory actions should be followed. First, in monitoring each country, we propose a swapping of specialists. For example,Korean specialists monitor Japan's environment and Japanese specialists check Chinese environment and so forth. The specialists who take part in monitoring prepare a report and  present the results in the joint environment Minister meeting. Based on these monitoring, each country is expected to set the goals of reducing the pollutants at the periods of 5, 10 and 15 years. Also we suggest that a protocol with these reduction goals written on it be signed at the summit meeting

Lastly the adult generation is bound in political and economical system. They may not see the environmental issue as top priority. After all it will be the young generation, not the current generation, who will live in an environmentally devastated world if we do not act now accordingly now. That is why the young generation should speak out and take actions now.

Effect Acid Rain On Canadians

What is the link between acid rain and human health?
Sulphurdioxide can react with water vapour and other chemicals in the air to form very fine particles of sulphate. These airborne particles form a key component of urban smog and are now recognized as a significant health hazard.

What are the health effects of particulate matter (PM)?
Fine particles, or particulate matter (PM), can lodge deep within the lungs, where they cause inflammation and damage to tissues. These particles are particularly dangerous to the elderly and to people with heart and respiratory diseases. Recent studies have identified strong links between high levels of airborne sulphate particles and increased hospital admissions for heart and respiratory problems, increased asthma-symptom days, as well as higher death rates from these ailments.

Pyramid
The air pollution health effects pyramid is a diagrammatic presentation of the relationship between the severity and frequency of health effects, with the mildest and most common effects at the bottom of the pyramid, e.g. symptoms, and the least common but more severe at the top of the pyramid, e.g. premature mortality. The pyramid demonstrates that as severity decreases, the number of people affected increases.

What are the costs to Canadians of these health effects?
By using computer models, scientists and economists can estimate the costs of these health effects to Canadians. They do this by computer simulations, where they eliminate SO2 emissions in increasing amounts to predict how the cases of heart and respiratory problems and premature mortality would decline. This decline in health effects represents a significant potential benefit to Canadians; however, it also represents the cost to Canadians of living with current SO2 emission levels.

For example, the expected health benefits to Canada of a 50% SO2 reduction in both eastern Canada and the U.S. (i.e., reductions above and beyond the current commitments in the Eastern Canada Acid Rain Program and U.S. Acid Rain Program) are:

550 premature deaths per year would be avoided;

• 1,520 emergency room visits per year would be unnecessary; and
• 210,070 asthma symptom days per year would be avoided.
• Economists estimate that society values these health benefits in a range from just under $500 million per year up to $5 billion per year.

The U.S. has also estimated the health benefits of their current Acid Rain Program, both to their citizens as well as to Canadians. The average total annual estimated health benefit  for  United States is US$10.6 billion, and rises to US$40.0 billion later, when the U.S. Acid Rain Program is fully implemented.

The estimated benefits for Canada occur primarily in the Windsor-Quebec corridor, where the greatest share of the Canadian population likely to be affected by transboundary transport of SO2 emissions from the eastern U.S. is located. The average total annual estimated health benefit for Canada is US$955 million, or well over a billion Canadian dollars.

Geographic Scenario of Acid Rain In India

By the year 2020, in India alone, the energy demand is expected to increase by 300% from the present level. If urgent prevention and control measures are not put in place from now, the SO2 emissions, as per TERI estimates, are expected to shoot-up more than the energy demand! In fact the model simulation shows a possibility of increase in SO2 emissions over present levels. Hence, even though the sulphur deposition levels in much of India today are below the critical levels for acid rain, by the year 2020 the picture will be painfully different, if immediate mitigative steps are not taken now.

Like China, in India too the main threat of an acid rain disaster springs from our heavy dependence on coal as a major energy source. Even though Indian coal is relatively low in sulphur content compared to the nature of coal reserves of other countries like China, what threatens to cause acid rain in India is the concentrated quantity of consumption, that is expected to reach very high levels in some parts of the country by 2020. As energy requirements in India are growing rapidly in tune with the growing economy, coal dependence in the country is expected to grow threefold over the current level of consumption, making the clouds of acid rain heavier over many highly sensitive areas in the country like the northeast region, parts of Bihar, Orissa, West Bengal and coastal areas in the south. Already the soils of these areas have a low pH value, which acid rain will aggravate further making them infertile and unsuitable for agriculture. The GREEN India 2047 project of TERI has estimated that India is already losing between 11% to 26% of agricultural output on account of soil degradation. Acid rain would only increase this figure significantly.

 The prospect of increasing consumption of coal in Asia makes the acid rain threat even more real than ever. Possible options for mitigation are: radical improvements in energy efficiency, a switchover to low sulphur fuels like natural gas, greater use of renewables, major cut-down and removal of sulphur from crude oil distillates like diesel, fuel oil, etc., and finally, the widespread use of state-of-the-art pollution control devices in all polluting sectors of the economy. As experience stands in Europe and north America, the threat of acid rain was severely dealt with in these regions through heavy spending on SO2 abatement technologies and rapidly cutting down the dependence on coal by shifting to natural gas and nuclear energy. But, action in these regions came only after a considerable amount of ecological damage. In the 1960s, fish populations in the Scandinavian countries were showing a rapid decline as a result of acid rain. The infamous forest dieback in some parts of central Europe was also from acid rain. Thus, experience from elsewhere bears out clearly enough that the whole problem as it confronts India needs proactive handling.

The issue of rapidly growing SO2 emissions, the resultant sulphur deposition and the threat of acid rain in many areas of Asia is a transboundary problem involving many countries and therefore, its solution calls for regional initiatives. In Europe, the worsening situation of acid deposition from many countries in ‘70s and the related concerns about the pollution being carried over long distances, led to the signing of an international agreement in 1979, called "The Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution". The signing of subsequent protocols led to binding commitments from European countries to limit and reduce their transboundary emissions of air pollutants. The worsening crisis of a long term acid-rain catastrophe in Asia, in the very near future, surely calls for urgent moves towards a similar agreement and binding protocols between the nations exposed to this threat in the not too distant future. And the action must begin now, as experience shows that all international agreements with binding commitments take long to bear fruit

Acid Rain In Europe

Over the last twenty years, policy-makers in Europe have been attempting to solve the problem of acid rain using detailed analysis grounded in natural science and economics. The results are impressive, as Europeans have successfully implemented a number of international agreements to reduce pollution emissions, agreements that in theory achieve the greatest environmental benefit at the lowest aggregate cost across Europe. This study examines the analysis on which these policies were based. First, it finds a pattern of investigating the use of cost-benefit analysis, together with a lack of usefulness associated with the actual results of such analysis. Second, it finds that the analytic framework that came to replace cost-benefit analysis— "critical loads"— contained many of the same uncertainties and political decisions that had plagued cost-benefit analysis. Nevertheless, "critical loads" analysis was temporarily seen as less value-laden and more reliable, and contributed significantly to policy development. The desire for rapid action led policy-makers to ignore or to overlook the politics and uncertainties inherent in efforts at scientific assessment and modeling.

It was Professor Sten Nilsson of IIASA’s Forest Study who first drew attention to the impact of pollution on Europe's forest resources, advocating the formulation of a convention on forest decline in Europe.His recommendation came in response to growing concern about damage to European forests attributed to air pollution and as a result of intensive collaboration between IIASA’s Transboundary Air Pollution Project and the Forest Study in efforts to quantify the problem.Combining its unique database on forest resources in Europe with projections on forest soil acidification obtained using IIASA's RAINS (Regional Acidification Information and Simulation model), IIASA’s Forest Study was able to quantify the impact of air pollution on Europe’s forest resources.

The work revealed that 35% of Europe’s coniferous forest and 9% of its deciduous forest areas were affected by nitrogen deposition levels (caused by nitrogen oxide emissions) in excess of those established by the Economic Commission for Europe  (ECE). In addition, 79%   of Europe’s coniferous forest areas and 39% of its deciduous forest areas were currently affected by levels of sulfur deposition in excess of the targets set by the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics.

Excess deposition of acids and exposure to atmospheric pollutants will damage trees of different types and ages, resulting in leaf and needle loss. Because the health of a tree
affects its growth rate, and both this and life expectancy affect the value and timing of
harvests, these calculations were important for forest industries, as well as from an ecological perspective.

Despite the current agreements on reducing emissions levels, the area of forest likely
to be affected by excess sulfur deposition in the future was unlikely to change, according to IIASA scientists, unless planned expenditures on emission control were increased or reallocated. Moreover, the work revealed that many of the areas likely to suffer from excess sulphur deposition would also experience excess nitrogen deposition and troubling levels of atmospheric ozone. This implied that many trees would suffer the effects of multiple pollutants.

Monitoring Of Acid Rain

Continuous emissions monitors (CEMs) tell us how much of a pollutant a power plant (or other affected facility) emits. Under the Acid Rain Program, each affected unit must monitor emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. Most also measure carbon dioxide. CEMs are the most common way to monitor emissions, but in some cases, Utilities may use an approved alternate method. For example, if a unit burns oil and they know the sulphur content of the oil and the amount they used, they can compute the amount of sulphurdioxide they will emit.

Each plant in the acid rain program must submit a monitoring plan to EPA and revise it as their monitoring system changes. This document tells which monitors will be used, where they will be located, and how the data will be gathered and sent to EPA. If a plant’s monitoring system changes, they must revise their monitoring plan.

There are several ways to monitor emissions from a plant. We measure nitrogen oxides by taking a sample of the gas emitted thought the plant’s smokestack and analyzing it. In some cases sulphurdioxide is measured this way, but we can also compute sulphur emissions from the fuel’s sulphur content, as noted above. When plants use natural gas, which contains only traces of sulfur, we may estimate the plant’s emissions by assuming the gas contains a certain low amount of sulfur. Sulfur emissions from such plants are so low that an actual measurement of sulfur dioxide is impractical.

Power plants must submit data whenever they are operating. If their monitor is not operating, they must report a "default" value, which is generally the maximum amount of the pollutant they can emit. EPA gathers the data, and tabulates the emissions form each plant.

Major Problematic Areas in Canada Due to Acid Rain

Eastern Canada

The problem areas of Canada are primarily in the eastern provinces that lie on the Canadian Shield and, therefore, lack natural buffers. Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are the most significantly damaged by acid rain. Most of the emissions that impact eastern Canada are produced at the large metal smelters in central Ontario and Quebec. Emissions from the US also affect Canada’s eastern region. In the US, the greatest amount of emissions comes from a high density of coal fired power plants in the eastern states. Weather systems carry these pollutants from the upper mid western US states across southern Ontario, southern Quebec and into the northeastern US. Pollutants also travel up the northeast corridor of the US into the Atlantic Provinces. 

Western Canada

Major emissions sources that impact western Canada are located in Alberta (from upstream oil and gas production and oil sands), southern Saskatchewan (from electric power generation) and northern Manitoba (from mining and smelting). However, there is currently not enough information to tell us how acid rain is affecting these ecosystems. Historically, western Canada has experienced less industrialization than eastern Canada. This factor, combined with east wardly moving weather patterns and acid resistant soils, has so far protected much of western Canada from the damage of acid rain. Not all areas in western Canada are naturally protected. Some lakes and soils rest on granitic bedrock, such as is found in areas of the Canadian Shield, in northeastern Alberta, northern Saskatchewan and Manitoba, parts of western British Columbia, and the Northwest Territories . Ecosystems in these areas are as vulnerable to acid rain as those found in northern Ontario. Acid rain may also become a regional problem downwind of the Alberta oil sands projects, where rapid expansion of bitumen extraction industries is expected to cause large increases in emissions of SO2  and NOX  in the next 20 years. A big concern to scientists is that if SO2  and NOX emissions continue to increase in western Canada, the same sort of acid rain damage that has happened in eastern Canada could occur in the west. 

Acid Rain In Canada

Not all areas of Canada are affected equally by acid rain.This is because areas differ in their ability to offset or neutralize acidity. This is largely determined by the type and rate of weathering of the soils and bedrock in the region.A region’s underlying bedrock (the geologic deposit from which a soil is derived by weathering) is the most important factor on how sensitive an area will be to acid rain. Alkaline substances, such as calcium, magnesium and potassium (known as “base cations”), are found in the earth’s bedrock and soil.

 In essence, when an acid and a base combine, they cancel each other out, producing a neutral substance. When the rain is only mildly acidic, there are enough alkaline substances to balance the acidity and neutralize the effects on the soil and water. However, when the rain is highly acidic, these acid-buffering substances can become depleted. There may not be enough of them to continually offset the acid effect of the rain. When nature can no longer buffer the effect, the balance is lost. This is what has been slowly happening for the past 100 years in the natural environment due to acid rain. The areas most affected by acid rain are those with shallow soil cover on slowly weathering bedrock (since beneficial alkaline substances are released as the bedrock is weathered by incoming rain). 

For example, igneous bedrock (e.g., the granite bedrock of the Canadian Shield that covers almost half of Canada) has a very low alkaline content and, therefore, can’t buffer the effects of acid rain. On the other hand, regions that are formed on limestone or sedimentary bedrock (e.g., southern Ontario and parts of western Canada), which contain high levels of calcium, can tolerate fairly high acidic deposits over long periods of time. Limestone is very alkaline, and so it can maintain an acceptable balance despite increased acidity.