Oh just another toxic spill no matter. Just 30 min later oh don't even worry about it.
Balloons every day last week. Toxic release everyday this week.
nitric acid is extremely hygroscopic; its really hard to separate it from water. cleanup will likely not be done properly
I assume I was right in thinking it might not be a big deal on the surface since it breaks down into harmless shit, but isn't exactly going to break down in the water supply?
it breaks down into NOx, toxic and oxidizing gases. and the process of it "breaking down" just means its reacting with other stuff in the environment, which will have unpredictable effects. it was only one tanker tho
Should break down via Heat + light -> NO2, O2, H2O which isn't the worst, but there's little heat + light under ground
NO2 is a NOx. NOx gases also dissolve in water at relatively high concentrations. it will also form NOx when reacting with other chemicals, and nitric acid will react with almost any organic chemical
I guess I figured NO2 wasn't a big deal because it's a trace gas in the atmosphere already but yeah idk
and you'd be right, gas diffuses quickly and even the amount that dissolves in the water will eventually off-gas. the NOx will be more of a local, acute problem. the nitric acid itself is worse. but still not nearly as bad as the East Palestine disaster. but the nitric acid will probably affect the local area for years, causing flora and fauna to die, and causing the drinking water for the local population to be an irritant and slightly toxic. nitric acid is hard to remove from water and amerika will not do it correctly
its not really that any one of these events is catastrophic. more that the cumulative effects of one event after another will lead to a continuous decrease in standard of living and life expectancy. and as the empire breaks down, these events will happen more often
