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Ozone Hole Getting Smaller

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the things-looking-up dept.

snark42 writes "According to Reuters and some other sources the hole in the ozone layer shrank 20% this year to a mere 9 million square miles. Of course scientists caution this would have to continue for at least a couple more years to be a trend or anything to get excited about."

16 of 352 comments (clear)

  1. hrmmm by rdc_uk · · Score: 5, Interesting

    20 years from now, we'll have discovered there's a natural grow/shrink cycle we never knew about...

    1. Re:hrmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Ya know, I coulda SWORN that we banned chloroflorocarbons a while back...
      The earth has a tremendous capacity to heal itself, every lightning strike adds ozone to the atmosphere, but the problem is that it takes many years for the newly created ozone to reach the ozone layer.
      Humans have the ability to fuck up the environment pretty bad, but we can also do a lot to help it.

    2. Re:hrmmm by mrmeval · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Or that it was outright fraud. Ozone hole fraud.

      --
      I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
    3. Re:hrmmm by jmcmunn · · Score: 3, Interesting


      I don't remember the exact numbers unfortunately, but I took a class on techtonics and volcanos in college and you would be surprised how bad for the ozone volcanos are. From what I remember the prof told us that a major volcanic event does more damage to the ozone than all of the chemicals that we humans have put up there in the past century.

      I wish I could remember the numbers, or find a site but no such luck.

    4. Re:hrmmm by fatman22 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      That cycle was discovered a long time ago during the IGY. The "Ozone Hole" over the Antarctic was larger in the mid-50's than it is today. If you carefully pick your measurement time during it's natural grow/shrink cycle, you can use the data to support any theory you want.

  2. Pardon my ignorance. by Moby+Cock · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This may be a stupid question *but*...

    Why can't we 'reseed' the ozone layer? We can make ozone in a lab, so why don't we get some high flying aircraft and strap some ozone filled bottles to the fuselage and start spraying? It'd be like dusting crops only a lot different.

    Although, it is good news that the hole is smaller.

    1. Re:Pardon my ignorance. by artemis67 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If we put every aircraft on the planet in the atmosphere, would it be enough to make a dent in nine million square miles? That doesn't seem likely.

    2. Re:Pardon my ignorance. by artemis67 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well, it's only an ASSUMPTION that we created the ozone hole and, if so, it took us a century to do it. We're going to reseed it in a short amount of time?

      The ENTIRE United States is only ~6 million sq. mi., including Alaska, just for reference. The first logistical problem that you have is, How do you manufacture that much ozone?

      However, we do know that the ozone layer naturally replenishes itself. So, if we had anything to do with the size of the hole (which is doubtful), then all we need to do is to reduce the number of harmful emissions. Which is a good idea, regardless.

  3. Re:The Return of Cheap Freon! by base3 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Interesting how Freon became dangerous right after DuPont's patent on it expired. There is nothing new under the Sun.

    --
    One CPU cycle wasted on digital restrictions management is ONE TOO MANY.
  4. It is a trend... by ari_j · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This was in the news at least 2 or 3 years ago (here on Slashdot, I believe). Sounds like a trend to me.

  5. Re:Hope this isn't used as an excuse... by Daimaou · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why would the US want to sign the Kyoto Accords? If I was the sane leader, or wannabe leader, of a sovereign nation I wouldn't sign it either.

    That's probably because I'm contrary and because I think environmentalists are insane.

  6. Industry used chlorine; bromine would be worse by ankhank · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ".... mankind has been very lucky and that things could have been truly catastrophic, with an "ozone hole" occurring everywhere, if industry, instead of chlorine, would have produced similarly large quantities of bromine-containing compounds...."

    http://www.iiasa.ac.at/Admin/INF/lectures/Koopmans /koopmans_crutzen_2003.html/

    Simple chemistry, unknown at the time industry chose to use chlorine, marginally cheaper, over bromine, in freons etc.

    Bromine in those applications would've wiped the upper ozone layer worldwide.

    Oh, and the 'skeptics' (Hogan)? -- note the dates on those pages being proffered and the elevation of the effects described. That parrot's dead.

  7. Relationship between global warming and ozone by Tau+Zero · · Score: 2, Interesting
    If I have the details right, global warming is a threat to ozone for two reasons:
    1. As the IR opacity of the atmosphere goes up, the depth of the troposphere (the part where heat is transferred by convection instead of radiation) increases. This cuts into the size of the stratosphere and decreases the amount of air in it, and thus the ozone it can hold.
    2. As the IR opacity of the troposphere increases, the stratosphere cools and conditions become more favorable for the formation of the ice crystals which are the most damaging catalysts for the destruction of ozone.
    HTH. HAND.
    --
    Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
  8. Re:Scientific Bias .... MOD Parent up by fygment · · Score: 2, Interesting

    C'mon, he's right. The reaction to a 20% increase would have been a resounding condemnation of all human industrial processes plus a descrying of all nations that haven't signed on to Kyoto, etc.

    Maybe what it all means is that we still have very little understanding of our environment and that any statements to the contrary are really politically motivated.

    --
    "Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
  9. Re:Kyoto isn't meant to work by GreyWolf3000 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I lived in China for a while. The Hong Kong/Guanzhou area makes LA seem like the swiss alps. They have just as many cars, and worse environmental standards. And massive, unregulated factories.

    --
    Slashdot: Where people pretend to be twice as smart as they really are by behaving like children.
  10. Counter-hype by teknokracy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    "Of course scientists caution this would have to continue for at least a couple more years to be a trend or anything to get excited about."

    Of course if the ozone hole got BIGGER by even 5%, we'd hear about it and feel guilty, wouldnt we? Where is the front page story about the fact that something GOOD is happening? We need more news like this to be exposed. Frankly I think that the global warming naysayers are correct, and anyone who thinks it's anything more than a global climate change (In fact its getting COLDER Where I live) is just out to get big industries, imho.