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RESEARCH scientists at Britain’s Forestry Commission have dismissed
the theory that tree planting causes the acidification of surface waters
because the trees channel airborne pollutants to the soil and thence to
the water. The government-appointed UK Acid Waters Review Group supports
the theory, but David Burdekin, the commission’s director of research, said
last week that no evidence exists linking trees and acidification ‘in the
absence of atmospheric deposition’.