imitation-angel
Member
Every winter on the media it is reported that the Ozone hole over Antarctica has grown huge. Well, what do they expect? It's going to do that each winter then disappear during summer
All this blaming industrial CFCs and Nitrous oxides from agriculture is nonsense.
Let's look at how Ozone (O3) forms:
Solar radiation enters the atmosphere, harmful UV strikes an oxygen molecule (O2) and splits it into 2x oxygen radicals which float around till they each find an O2 molecule and bond with it, forming O3. This is how the dangerous UV radiation is filtered out before it can cause skin cancer.
BUT.... Around Feb/ March every year the sun sets in Antarctica and the night lasts 6 months. Suddenly no UV coming in to create O3 so gradually ozone breaks down and reforms pure oxygen.
Then around Oct each year we have sunrise and new measurements of O3 can take place. OOPS! all the ozone has gone!
Oh no cry people, we're all doomed! It must be our fault. Quickly the blame was attached to chloroflurocarbons (CFC) and many countries banned them.
But then what's this? During summer when there is 24hour light the hole starts filling because O3 is being created. WHEW! Say the people, It must be because we banned CFCs lets start giving lots of money to big business to find replacement gases for nasty CFC
Then by the end of summer the sun goes down and O3 starts to disappear again. The trouble is we need sunshine to measure O3 so we continue life as normal. It's ok, it's winter so people aren't running round naked getting sunburned, but then comes summer again and we all strip off . Oh bugger, there's a bloody great hole in the ozone layer and we're all gonna die of melanoma. We need to throw some more money at the problem. Du Pont have almost discovered new gases to fill refrigeration units with.
In the rush to lay blame for everything happening in nature, people have lost touch with it altogether. Nature has a way of maintaining cycles that ensure Earth is a good place to live.
One of the reasons I was attracted by the atmospheric sciences in the first place was how
earth takes care of itself and us. There's a lot more than ozone or climate and this is only about O3. The atmosphere is as endlessly fascinating as the biosphere.
All this blaming industrial CFCs and Nitrous oxides from agriculture is nonsense.
Let's look at how Ozone (O3) forms:
Solar radiation enters the atmosphere, harmful UV strikes an oxygen molecule (O2) and splits it into 2x oxygen radicals which float around till they each find an O2 molecule and bond with it, forming O3. This is how the dangerous UV radiation is filtered out before it can cause skin cancer.
BUT.... Around Feb/ March every year the sun sets in Antarctica and the night lasts 6 months. Suddenly no UV coming in to create O3 so gradually ozone breaks down and reforms pure oxygen.
Then around Oct each year we have sunrise and new measurements of O3 can take place. OOPS! all the ozone has gone!
Oh no cry people, we're all doomed! It must be our fault. Quickly the blame was attached to chloroflurocarbons (CFC) and many countries banned them.
But then what's this? During summer when there is 24hour light the hole starts filling because O3 is being created. WHEW! Say the people, It must be because we banned CFCs lets start giving lots of money to big business to find replacement gases for nasty CFC
Then by the end of summer the sun goes down and O3 starts to disappear again. The trouble is we need sunshine to measure O3 so we continue life as normal. It's ok, it's winter so people aren't running round naked getting sunburned, but then comes summer again and we all strip off . Oh bugger, there's a bloody great hole in the ozone layer and we're all gonna die of melanoma. We need to throw some more money at the problem. Du Pont have almost discovered new gases to fill refrigeration units with.
In the rush to lay blame for everything happening in nature, people have lost touch with it altogether. Nature has a way of maintaining cycles that ensure Earth is a good place to live.
One of the reasons I was attracted by the atmospheric sciences in the first place was how
earth takes care of itself and us. There's a lot more than ozone or climate and this is only about O3. The atmosphere is as endlessly fascinating as the biosphere.
