Ground Truth: Forest Service Research · Episode 7 of 10 · 25 min
How Decades of Monitoring Saved American Forests
Scientists who simply kept measuring rain at Hubbard Brook, New Hampshire, found precipitation up to a hundred times more acidic than expected, documenting acid rain in North America. The episode follows how decades of watershed records at Hubbard Brook, Coweeta, Fernow and the Andrews Forest shaped the 1990 Clean Air Act and old-growth policy, and why such patient measurement is fragile.
Who's who
- Gene E. LikensEcologist who co-founded the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study
- F. Herbert BormannForest ecologist and Hubbard Brook co-founder
- Noye M. JohnsonCo-founder of the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study
- Robert S. PierceForest Service hydrologist and Hubbard Brook co-founder
Where it happens
- Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, New Hampshire+1 more episodeWhere acid rain was systematically documented
- Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory, North CarolinaLong watershed record, established 1934
- Fernow Experimental Forest, West VirginiaWatershed and acid-deposition research site
- H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest, OregonOld-growth and spotted owl research site
Timeline
- 1934Coweeta and Fernow experimental forests established
- 1955Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest established
- 1963Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study launched
- 1972Likens, Bormann and Johnson publish acid-rain findings in Science
- 1990Clean Air Act Amendments create a sulfur dioxide cap-and-trade program
- 2007National SO2 emissions fall below the program's goal
Still debated
Acid rain had been described in Britain in the 1800s, so Hubbard Brook is better called its first systematic North American documentation. Scholars also caution that the 1990 law rested on many sites, not Hubbard Brook alone.