A UC Davis study had found that 20-32% of nitrogenous gasses in California are emitted from farms and agriculture. In the article, nitrogenous gasses are called NOx. The original study was performed in Northern California, near Sacramento, but NOx gasses have been found all over the state. NOx gasses are linked to respiratory disease, asthma, cancer, birth defects, cardiovascular diseases, ozone depletion, and acid rain. The article states that farmers and the agricultural industry need to start taking into consideration how much NOx they are emitting.
This article focuses in on one component of acid rain, which is nitrogen gas. Nitrogenous gasses are some of the most influential parts of acid rain and climate change. This article describes exactly how experiments were run in order to find certain levels of NOx gas in all of California. It also does a good job at expanding on a previous study. This article asks questions and tries to make a solution to the problem at hand.
It’s all about NOx and SOx… I’ve always associated acid rain with big power plants and traffic, but hadn’t considered agriculture as a driver of it too. This is an extra relevant article given we’ve just been studying food production. DId they say which part of agg does it? I would think fertilizer production, but it sounds like it’s coming directly from the farms.