What causes acid rain.
What happens to granite due to acid rain.
Acid rain harms fish and trees but it also makes chemical weathering.
The term acid rain is a popular expression for the more formal and scientific term acid deposition.
However the acid found in rain snow fog and dust is beginning to affect some granite buildings and statues granite lake beds and the wildlife they contain.
Acid deposition can be caused by natural sources such as volcanoes but it is mainly caused by the release of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide during fossil fuel combustion when these gases are discharged into the atmosphere they react with the water oxygen and other gases already present there to form sulfuric acid ammonium nitrate and nitric acid.
When the sulfur dioxide dissolves in the water in the clouds it makes acid rain rainwater that is more acidic than normal.
These acidic compounds.
The chemicals fall to earth as acid rain.
Prevailing winds transport the acidic compounds hundreds of miles often across state and national borders.
Acid precipitation affects stone primarily in two ways.
Of all the building stones granite is the least susceptible to acid rain because its composition is of feldspar and quartz both of which resist attacks of acid.