Confronting the Acid Test

New studies increase pressures for action on a polluting rainfall

A puckish caller once asked Interior Secretary James Watt during a radio talk show whether his baldness was caused by acid rain. Watt laughed off the wisecrack, as well he might. In spite of rising concern in the Northeast and Canada, Administration spokesmen have repeatedly insisted that nothing could really be done about acid rain and the industry-produced sulfur emissions allegedly behind them until all the scientific facts were in. Suddenly last week, however, facts came raining down like a summer squall, in effect making further scientific debate on what mainly causes the problem all but irrelevant.

Precipitating the downpour was a study commissioned by Presidential Science Adviser George Keyworth II. The White House panel bluntly called for remedial action even if some technical questions about acid rain were still unanswered. "If we take the conservative point of view that we must wait until the scientific knowledge is definitive," said the panel, "the accumulated deposition [of acid rain] and damaged environment may reach the point of 'irreversibility.' "

When it rains, it pours. Next came a study from the National Research Council, an arm of the august National Academy of Sciences. Its unequivocal conclusion: reducing emissions of sulfur dioxide from coal-burning power plants and factories, such as those in the Midwest, would in fact significantly reduce the acidity in rain, snow and other precipitation that is widely believed to be sapping the life from fresh-water lakes and forests in the Northeast and Canada. The panel did not recommend any specific action. But, concluded Committee Chairman Jack Calvert, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, if industry gets "off the dime" and lawmakers mandate emission controls, "we'll guarantee an effect."

A pair of remedial measures are already before Congress. A Senate committee recently approved a bill that would require reduction over the next decade of sulfur-dioxide emissions by 10 million tons in the states bordering on and east of the Mississippi. A tougher measure was introduced in the House ordering the 50 largest sulfur polluters in the U.S. to cut emissions substantially. To appease the Eastern coal mining industry, which fears a switch to low-sulfur Western coal, the bill requires the installation of expensive "scrubbers," devices for removing sulfur from the smoke, rather than a ban on high-sulfur fuel. Still, the legislation is being vigorously opposed by the coal industry and utilities, especially in the Midwest, where heavy industries are battling to survive. In a survey also released last week, the Edison Electric Institute, an industry group, ominously predicted that electricity rates could rise as much as 50% if the emissions-control legislation passed.

Government studies dispute these figures, but Congress has been deadlocked on acid-rain measures. Now, as a result of the academy study, proponents of the bills are more optimistic. Said Vermont Republican Robert Stafford, cosponsor of the Senate proposal: "The report will enhance the opportunity to pass legislation." The Reagan Administration also seems to be moving in this direction. Still another report, probably setting forth some proposed options, is expected from a special task force named by William Ruckelshaus, the Environmental Protection Agency's new chief. Nonetheless, a major political battle is shaping up. Now the central question is not "What is the problem?" but rather "How will the pollution be cleaned up--and who will foot the bill?" This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.