I remember as a young child being really worried about the fact that there would be acid rain. What happened to it? It makes me think that Global warning is just a similar myth. Can anyone explain or shed any light on the disappearance of the umbrella destroying rain?

Low sulphur diesel.

http://www.slate.com/id/2225509/

We solved it, low sulphur fuels, sulphur recovery from power stations etc.

Same as CFC’s and the ozone layer.

Only problem is global warming could dwarf either of those issues, yet we seem determined to do SFA about it.

Offset by all the alkaline batteries in landfills.

(this may not be true)

Collapse of the Soviet Union and shutting down of shitty cheap brown coal-burning factories. Rise of catalytic convertors and sulphur-scrubbers.

Acid rain did a lot of damage to forests in Germany and Scandinavia, not so much in the UK. It was clear what the causes were and “clean air” type laws were passed throughout Europe. These laws were a success and acid rain is no longer the problem it once was (in Europe).
A similar story could be told of cleaning up the rivers.
Sometimes mankind actually has a success story, doesn’t make the problem a myth just means we did something about it.

A very American article. But this:

most rainwater in the region has a pH level between 4.3 and 4.8

😯

Average is 5.2 though IIRC, CO2 is acidic so even clean rainwater is slightly acidic.

Interesting. I thought it just disappeared. I guess it proves we can actually solve problems if we put our minds to it.

What happened with the ozone layer out of interest? Did that get solved/heal itself?

well, scientists warned us about it, we got scared, our governments did something about it, and things got better.

the same thing happened with the hole(s) in the ozone layer.

neither problem has gone away, but things have improved a lot.

the solution to acid rain is/was to avoid burning stuff with sulphur in it.

the solution to ozone depletion is/was to use alternatives to CFC’s.

the solution to climate change is to have less fun (burn less fuel, buy less tat, eat less meat, etc.), so we’ve decided to ignore it.

poppa: yes, the ozone layer is ‘healing’ itself, slowly.

Good thing it stopped.

The acid was eating away at the hair of men causing baldness.

For proof, look at an older man and he’s bald, but young men who have not been exposed have far too much hair.

🙂

@epicyclo,
that must be true, coz i dont have much hair on top of my head, but inside my ears (where i dont tend to get much rain) there is loads of hair.

I thought it just disappeared.

I know this is a tangent, but it’s a similar story with the “Millennium Bug.” Ask anyone these days and they’ll go “ah, yeah, that was a lot of fuss over a non-event,” completely oblivious to the fact that it was a non-event due to a lot of people working bloody hard to ensure that everything was fixed in time.

It was a major achievement which should’ve been a massive feather in the cap for IT departments around the world, and instead everyone went “oh, was that it?”

What happened with the ozone layer out of interest? Did that get solved/heal itself?

Not according to my colleage from New Zealand. Although it’s apparently doing better than it was.

Thing is, acid rain and ozone depletion were simple – ban or limit the bad stuff.

Banning CO2 emissions is a tad harder.

molgrips – Member
Banning CO2 emissions is a tad harder.

Especially since the causal link between Co2 and climate change is not proven. 🙂

(Before any body tries to pull me up on this, get stuck in over here first)

Cougar – Member
I know this is a tangent, but it’s a similar story with the “Millennium Bug.” Ask anyone these days and they’ll go “ah, yeah, that was a lot of fuss over a non-event,” completely oblivious to the fact that it was a non-event due to a lot of people working bloody hard to ensure that everything was fixed in time.

So bloody true. Even now I occasionally find legacy stuff still working only as a result of some bad coding miracle. I’m hoping the UNIX epoch problem will keep me in work as of 2038…

http://www.acidreign.co.cc/disc.html

classic band. though personally i prefered lawnmower deth.

Even now I occasionally find legacy stuff still working only as a result of some bad coding miracle. I’m hoping the UNIX epoch problem will keep me in work as of 2038…

I was doing a lot of ODBC work at the time and was responsible for quite a few “patches” that could be described as exactly that. I suspect that any maintenance programmers that come after me might get a giggle out of some of the comments in the source code.

I’d like to think that we’ll all be a little more prepared for the next one. However, I’m not that naiive. (-:

I know this is a tangent, but it’s a similar story with the “Millennium Bug.” Ask anyone these days and they’ll go “ah, yeah, that was a lot of fuss over a non-event,” completely oblivious to the fact that it was a non-event due to a lot of people working bloody hard to ensure that everything was fixed in time.

Struggling to think of a poorer comparison tbh. Acid rain is a similar story to the Y2K bug? 😀 That’s clearly a (successful) attempt at humour.

One is well understood and quantified with clear endpoints, and the effects of our intervention can be measured and are widely appreciated. The other is none of those things, but did personally benefit a great number of IT consultants.
Not that I begrudge you benefiting from the this scam, mind – like the kid in The Wire says, ‘I’ll take any motherfkers money if they giving it away’.
No need to rub our noses in it though by equating it with real problems like acid rain.

i think the attitude towards global warming compared with acid rain/cfcs is indicative of the change in attitude that the public has toward science;
these days plenty of armchair experts and ill-informed top gear presenters with newspaper columns think they know better than people whove dedicated their entire lives to studying a subject
sensationalist media scare stories have made us sceptical of men in white coats

IIRC Top Gear accept global warming? They laugh and joke about it but crucially they do accept that it is happening and is the result of CO2 emissions.

One way or another we’ll solve it, my moneys on technology driven by high oil prices though rather than actual will power or foresighted investment.

Struggling to think of a poorer comparison tbh

The rest of your post goes on to demonstrate the shortfalls in your cognitive processes which would explain your struggle.

My point was simply this. In both cases, where a problem is dealt with effectively, no-one really notices or assumes that it was a fuss about nothing. If it hadn’t been, everyone would have been up in arms.

Of course, comparing computer programming errors with global climate catastrophes is a daft thing to do. But that wasn’t what I was doing. I was comparing the reactions of the public after the event (or rather, the lack of reactions therein).

As for a “scam,” the issues were wide and various, and caused either by short-sightedness (as systems were running far longer than was ever intended), or actual physical restrictions (a two year date takes up less memory than a four-digit one, a critical saving back in ‘the day’).

I’m sure there were exceptions, but I can assure you that the majority of IT staff would have rather been spending their time seeing in the new millennium with family and friends than having to sit alone in a dark office at work “just in case” – I know I certainly would have. Some people probably turned a nice profit out of it, but regular viewers here will be unsurprised to learn that I wasn’t one of them.

It makes me think that Global warning is just a similar myth.

Stunning piece of logic and critical thinking there. ‘I haven’t heard about acid rain for a while, though I don’t know what happened to it, therefore global warming isn’t true.’ 😛

Don’t worry if we ‘fix’ global warming there will be another environmental problem (disaster?) just around the corner.

I’ve not heard much about possible problems with the Nitrogen cycle recently or man made links but that could potentially be a nightmare for future generations to worry about.

Then if we run out of genuine problems we can also create hysteria about the possible solutions to some of them, GM crops anyone?

I’m more concerned that I may only have about 40 years to live and I’m not riding my bike at the moment, I am sure this massive planet will out live all here! get out and ride on it!

P.S what happened to Acid House?