Term | Definition |
Environmental impact | Positive or negative impacts on the environment. |
Economic Impact | Positive or negative impact on the economy. |
Chemical reaction | A chemical change that occurs when two or more substances combine to form a new substance. |
End product | The final material or substance left at the completion of a series of reactions |
Reactants | Elements and compounds that are present at the beginning of a chemical reaction. |
Acid rain | Mixture of wet and dry deposition from the atmosphere containing higher than normal amounts of nitric and sulfuric acids. |
Degradation of water | The process of reducing to a lower condition, quality or level of water. |
Degradation of air quality | The process of reducing to a lower condition, quality or level of air. |
Ozone depletion | The reducing of the ozone. |
Deposited material | Material that is laid down or left behind by a natural process. |
Nitric acid | A clear, colorless to yellow liquid that is very corrosive and can dissolve most metals; used to make fertilizers, explosives, dyes, and rocket fuels. |
Sulfuric acid | A highly corrosive, dense, oily liquid, colorless to dark brown; used to manufacture fertilizers, paints, detergents, and explosives. |
Wet deposition | The accumulation of acids that fall to the Earth dissolved in water including acid rain, snow, and fog. |
Dry deposition | The accumulation of acidic particles that settle out of the atmosphere or of acidic gases that are absorbed by plant tissues or other surfaces. |
Greenhouse gases | Gases absorb infrared radiation, e.g., carbon dioxide and chlorofluorocarbons. |
Greenhouse effect | The trapping of the sun's warmth in a planet's lower atmosphere due to the greater transparency of the atmosphere to visible radiation from the sun than to infrared radiation emitted from the planet's surface. |
Acidification | To make or become acid. |
Air pollutant | Pollution of the atmosphere |
Stratosphere | The region of the atmosphere above the troposphere and below the mesosphere. |
Ultraviolet light | The range of invisible radiation wavelength from about 4 nanometers, on the border of the x - ray region, to about 380 nanometers, just beyond violet in the visible spectrum. |
pH | Lower values are more acid, and higher values more alkaline. |
Buffer | A solution that resists changes in pH when acid or alkali is added to it. |