NASA Reveals New Results From Inside the Ozone Hole – Dec. 11, 2013
NASA scientists have revealed the inner workings of the ozone hole that forms annually over Antarctica and found that declining chlorine in the stratosphere has not yet caused a recovery of the ozone hole.
More than 20 years after the Montreal Protocol agreement limited human emissions of ozone-depleting substances, satellites have monitored the area of the annual ozone hole and watched it essentially stabilize, ceasing to grow substantially larger. However, two new studies show that signs of recovery are not yet present, and that temperature and winds are still driving any annual changes in ozone hole size.
“Ozone holes with smaller areas and a larger total amount of ozone are not necessarily evidence of recovery attributable to the expected chlorine decline,” said Susan Strahan of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “That assumption is like trying to understand what’s wrong with your car’s engine without lifting the hood.”
To find out what’s been happening under the ozone hole’s hood, Strahan and Natalya Kramarova, also of NASA Goddard, used satellite data to peer inside the hole. The research was presented Wednesday at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.
Kramarova tackled the 2012 ozone hole, the second-smallest hole since the mid 1980s. To find out what caused the hole’s diminutive area, she turned to data from the NASA-NOAA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership satellite, and gained the first look inside the hole with the satellite’s Ozone Mapper and Profiler Suite’s Limb Profiler. Next, data were converted into a map that shows how the amount of ozone differed with altitude throughout the stratosphere in the center of the hole during the 2012 season, from September through November.
The map revealed that the 2012 ozone hole was more complex than previously thought. Increases of ozone at upper altitudes in early October, carried there by winds, occurred above the ozone destruction in the lower stratosphere.
“Our work shows that the classic metrics based on the total ozone values have limitations – they don’t tell us the whole story,” Kramarova said.
The classic metrics create the impression that the ozone hole has improved as a result of the Montreal protocol. In reality, meteorology was responsible for the increased ozone and resulting smaller hole, as ozone-depleting substances that year were still elevated. The study has been submitted to the journal of Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.
Separate research led by Strahan tackled the holes of 2006 and 2011 – two of the largest and deepest holes in the past decade. Despite their similar area, however, Strahan shows that they became that way for very different reasons.
Strahan used data from the NASA Aura satellite’s Microwave Limb Sounder to track the amount of nitrous oxide, a tracer gas inversely related to the amount of ozone depleting chlorine. The researchers were surprised to find that the holes of 2006 and 2011 contained different amounts of ozone-depleting chlorine. Given that fact, how could the two holes be equally severe?
The researchers next used a model to simulate the chemistry and winds of the atmosphere. Then they re-ran the simulation with the ozone-destroying reactions turned off to understand the role that the winds played in bringing ozone to the Antarctic. Results showed that in 2011, there was less ozone destruction than in 2006 because the winds transported less ozone to the Antarctic – so there was less ozone to lose. This was a meteorological, not chemical effect. In contrast, wind blew more ozone to the Antarctic in 2006 and thus there was more ozone destruction. The research has been submitted to the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
This work shows that the severity of the ozone hole as measured by the classic total column measurements does not reveal the significant year-to-year variations in the two factors that control ozone: the winds that bring ozone to the Antarctic and the chemical loss due to chlorine.
Until chlorine levels in the lower stratosphere decline below the early 1990s level – expected sometime after 2015 but likely by 2030 – temperature and winds will continue to dictate the variable area of the hole in any given year. Not until after the mid 2030s will the decline stratospheric chlorine be the primary factor in the decline of ozone hole area.
“We are still in the period where small changes in chlorine do not affect the area of the ozone hole, which is why it’s too soon to say the ozone hole is recovering,” Strahan said. “We’re going into a period of large variability and there will be bumps in the road before we can identify a clear recovery.”
Related Links
› NASA Goddard’s Ozone Hole Watch website
“That assumption is like trying to understand what’s wrong with your car’s engine without lifting the hood.”
In other words the Montreal Protocol was a hoax? Oh.
NASA, did the UN even authorize you to admit that?
The ozone hole hoax was good practice for becoming a climate skeptic. All of the same ingredients; media hype, end of the world predictions and a boogieman that actually benefited mankind.
The researchers next used a model to simulate the chemistry and winds of the atmosphere.
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We’re saved!
Or CFCs were not the primary driver of the OBSERVED ozone hole: meaning that even without CFCs, there would still be a significantly large hole in the ozone layer. CFCs could make an ozone hole worse, but no-CFCs won’t make the hole completely collapse.
Like CO2 and the thermal regulation of the planet, the assumption is that CFCs control the size of the Antarctic ozone hole. Why? Because “we” don’t have any other idea about what might cause large variations in its size.
The obsessive drive for a Unique Solution is everywhere politicians, scientists and laymen want or need simple solutions easily and cheaply put in-place.
There was a multinational that did very well out of this scam, but its name eludes me.
I do not read anything about a huge factor with the decline in sun spot activity in last two cycles and #24 being the lowest in some 200 years.
High sunspot activity and CME’s destroyes Ozone cooling the stratosphere.
Ozone layer has been getting a break since 2008 with the quiet sun but ozone destroying CFC’s are still in lots of older products snd are leaking out the CFC’s.
I have see in the past few years people will punch a hole in old AC unit containing CFC’s so they do not have to pay for propper removal of the cfc’s in the unit.
Chlorine in the atmosphere has natural sources. The ocean releases far more chlorine into the atmosphere than CFCs. It was always about control, never about science.
I seem to recall several studies about bromides(?) being produced off of ocean waves and fresh Arctic snow…. or do those affect ozone at the wrong places?
“That assumption is like trying to understand what’s wrong with your car’s engine without lifting the hood.”
“In other words the Montreal Protocol was a hoax?”
Hoax? Of course not. The new climate rule, as outlined by the latest IPCC report, states that science should increase certainty of an atmospheric process as time goes on………..up to 95% when empirical data contradicts your expectations.
After all, real climate scientists are never wrong, the data just needs to be interpreted the right way.
Al Gore, not being a real climate scientist, jumped the gun in 2006 by stating “The science is settled”. The IPCC needed another 7 years, using their unique interpretation of contradictory empirical data to come to that conclusion.
All based on another failed presumption of attribution.
Sheesh! Another instance of quack science layered on top of a bogus hypothesis, sprinkled with predictions of doom and destruction.
Anyone want to want to recall DDT? Never had any connection with raptor eggshells or mortality or survivability. Another perfectly good chemical (for killing malaria-bearing mosquitos) was eliminated from the human arsenal of promoting better living standards. Rachel Carson may rot in Hell for her role in the preventable deaths of millions of poor children.
As a chronic asthmatic, I need a rescue inhaler that used to be charged with a very effective propellant of halogenated-hydrocarbons. Got sacked by the “Montreal Protocol” and the replacement propellant ain’t worth sh*t.
This is not “Better living through chemistry”, as the old ad slogan stated
Make sure to let the idiots at the DIscovery channel know this.
Correct me if I am wrong, but didn’t the ozone hole exist in the first satellite records, and it was concluded that the hole was unnatural (hence the Montreal Protocol)? Was there ever any non-satellite evidence that stratospheric ozone was being depleted before the satellites reported the “hole”?
I’m of the impression that the answer is “no”, but I cannot find a reference to back my hypothesis.
As I recall, the proposal that CFCs were the main drivers for the loss of ozone was made on lab experiments and models alone, with little or no sampling and understanding of what was actually going on. This is not surprising – a full sampling program of the polar stratosphere in the 1980s would have been tricky and costly.
I had heard that the main reason that the Protocol was agreed was that DuPont suddenly changed their minds and supported it. And that this was because their patents on CFCs were about to run out, and they were going to lose a valuable part of their product list. If CFCs could be made illegal, people would have to use second-best substitutes, which DuPont had been inventing (in a vain attempt to make a better CFC), and which DuPont still had patents on…
I guess we’ll never know…
The ozone layer is not homogeneous. It has pillars like a plasma formation. So any current model will fail if trying to predict anything about it like depletion from CFC’s….
In other news Oh No’s….
Newly discovered greenhouse gas ‘7,000 times more powerful than CO2’
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/dec/10/new-greenhouse-gas-powerful-chemical-perfluorotributylamine
Is it just possible that the Ozone hole has always been there?
@ Geology Jim — re: Rachel Carson, regardless of where she ended up, you are right about one thing: she was a main cause of the deaths of millions.
I’m very sorry to hear that you have to deal with such a lousy inhaler situation. It’s one thing for the Envirostalinists to force us to use detergents and household cleaners that aren’t worth a rat’s squeak, but, it is just plain ev1l that they deny you effective medicine. Take care, WUWT ally for truth.
********************************
“… wind blew more ozone to the Antarctic in 2006 and thus there was more ozone destruction.”
And more people live along the beaches, so more people die in hurricanes (“Hurricanes More Deadly Now! Story at 11”), and…. on and on — ad nauseum.
Way to get the truth out, all you fine commenters of WUWT!!
HURRAH FOR AN-THO-NY WATTS! A shining light for truth in the darkness of l1es and corruption that is the “science community.”
Maybe they shouldn’t assume the chemistry model is correct if the real results don’t match the model. Wait, we believe models and not our lying eyes.
DocattheAutopsy:
The first satellites that specifically went looking for ozone depletion found the hole, but for all we know the hole has been there for hundreds, thousands, or millions of years or longer. As far as I know, there is no conclusive data indicating that the hole was not there prior to the widespread use of CFC’s.
My daughters inhaler went from a $5 copay to a $35 copay due to the new degraded but now patent protected version of the propellant. Blame Dupont for lobbying to change it as well as our avaricious incompetent legislators who saw the campaign dollars.
The Ozone hole scare looks just like Catastrophic Runaway Man-Made Global Warming. It’s a pile of horse manure fit for the very best kept gardens. The ozone hole is most probably made a little bigger by man’s CFS but some argue that the ozone hole has always been there.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/20/daleo-on-ozone-hole-it-is-very-likely-to-have-been-there-forever/
Apparently there is a North Pole ozone hole as well as a Tibetan hole. How many more holes can I take?
I have my doubts about the DDT story as well, but pelicans have definitely come back in LA and I think elsewhere. Has anyone seen explanations of this that do not involve DDT? I have not looked into the papers that linked DDT to weak shells, but have been meaning to.
If you suspect that something is causing a problem and you apply the fix for that but somehow it doesn’t cause a recovery would you at some point conclude that you were mistaken about the cause in the first place? Why do they stick to their original theories so adamantly? I think it’s time to reevaluate.
How about mankind just let the Earth get on with what it does and not worry about trying to pin the blame on anyone or anything.
Not one of the doomsayers has ever gotten anything right. They squawk and strut and tear their hair and look for billion dollar handouts (you’d think that’s enough to make anyone twig to what’s going on). After centuries of repeated shenanigans, is it too much to suppose that one day – ooh, maybe in a couple more millennium – human beings might pull themselves together, give each and every doomsayer that pops up a swift kick in the pants (or mandatory jail time), and get on with living and enjoying life?
How peaceful life would be, and what marvels could we learn, if each and every generation were not taught guilt just for being alive? Too much to hope for? Oh, well.
How much chlorine is released into the atmosphere from everyday uses like laundry and swimming pools? Seems to me that IF chlorine is responsible they just banned something that would let them make more money.
Here is Jeffrey Masters, Ph.D. — Director of Meteorology, Weather Underground, Inc. arguing against himself. He fails to ask AND answer one question: Has the hole always been there?
Sorry, here is the link.
http://www.wunderground.com/resources/climate/ozone_skeptics.asp
As I understand it the Antarctic ozone hole grows in the winter and shrinks in the summer – lending one to suspect that the hole has more to do with the extremely cold temperatures, and the total lack of sunlight – sunlight which is needed to generate ozone in the first place. However I’m no expert, just an interested bystander who tries to think about issues.
Questions I’d like to ask include – what is the wind pattern in the upper atmosphere over the South Pole in the winter? Does this pattern change in the summer? Are there any older scientific records from Antarctica which could possibly give us a history of the ozone hole prior to the satellites?
CFCs have nothing to do with the Ozone above the Antarctic.
Maybe thats why it’t not healing.
Next!
I think the Ozone just gets moved out of the polar vortex at the end of the winter, to the sides of the polar vortex.
Some of the highest readings of Ozone in the atmosphere anywhere are at the edges of the polar vortex when the hole has formed.
For example, Ozone on October 20, 2013 from the new OMI instrument. Yes, there is a big hole but there are also areas on the edge of the (misshapen at this time) vortex which are the highest numbers in the atmosphere. Polar view first, global second.
ftp://toms.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/omi/images/spole/Y2013/IM_ozspl_omi_20131020.png
ftp://toms.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/omi/images/global/Y2013/IM_ozgbl_omi_20131020.png
Perhaps it’s becuase CFCs don’t have anything to do with ozone depletion?
In fact, I clearly remember the very first measurement of the ozone hole- and based on that single data point global catastrophe and human causation was projected.
Gerry Parker
DocattheAutopsy says:
December 11, 2013 at 3:53 pm
—————————————–
Doc,
I will have to search for the reference as it is in 1950’s hardcopy book on space science. I recall that early results from Russian sub-orbital sound rockets led them to conclude that ozone would be naturally thin if not non existent over the poles. This was well before Sputnik.
Quote↘
“Not until after the mid 2030s will the decline stratospheric chlorine be the primary factor in the decline of ozone hole area.”
OK, so WT* did he say?
This study is almost complete speculation based on a science that we obviously don’t even understand yet.
Reminds me of something I heard in a song once!
“Money for nothin and your checks for free”
Video redacted ▶
20 years ago Dixy Lee Ray in “Environmental Overkill: Whatever Happened to Common Sense?” pointed out that the ozone layer is in fact created by UV dissociating O2 and that , having a finite half life , it’s not surprising that it is depleted during the course of the sunless polar winters . Additional chlorine may speed that depletion , but it always has and always will occur . Further , it has no consequence for surface life because it happens literally where the sun don’t shine .
The extremism of the eco-statists on this topic is displayed by their undoubtedly killing at least some asthma sufferers by criminalizing the most effective affordable inhaler , Primatine Mist , for the gram or so of propellant each contains .They even have refused to permit the sales of already created inventory despite their being no simple way to dispose of them without releasing their CFCs . ( I laid in a supply before the ban , which given my infrequent need , should last a number of years . )
I consider these people criminal misanthropes .
Another funding please Scare winding up??? Notice the pic from AP.
http://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/1378485/scientists-discover-earths-most-powerful-greenhouse-gas-date
Regards
For the back story look at Dow Corning’s patent on Freon that when it was about to expire and south american factories were ready to start producing it much cheaper “research” came out about how CFCs were destroying ozone and with some well coordinated manoeuverings the Montreal protocol was set in motion. The damning research… well that just happened to come from Dow Corning who was ready to save the day with a much less effective but delightfully more expensive replacement that they had the patent on. Follow the money. You will also find some of the names behind the Montreal Protocol hanging around Kyoto. Best show in town.
Bill Illis says: December 11, 2013 at 5:13 pm
I think the Ozone just gets moved out of the polar vortex at the end of the winter, to the sides of the polar vortex.
Yes, the “ozone hole” is likely a result of the dynamical effect of the stratospheric polar vortex, i.e.:
And there are other “holes” along with the ozone one, i.e.
For those not familiar, Polar Vortices:
Polar Vortices and their “holes” also exist on Mars;
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/sixthmars2003/pdf/3248.pdf
Venus;
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/09/venus-polar-vortex/
Saturn;
http://www.windows2universe.org/saturn/atmosphere/south_polar_vortex.html
and Saturn’s Moon Titan;
http://www.space.com/16520-saturn-s-moon-titan-sports-polar-vortex-video.html
However, it is not really “at the end of the winter”, but the second half. The Southern Hemisphere Polar Vortex usually occurs from May to December;
NOAA – National Weather Service – Climate Prediction Center – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
NOAA – National Weather Service – Climate Prediction Center – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
and the Southern Hemisphere Ozone “Hole” from August to December:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
There never was an ozone hole, the area of thinning is on average one third the average level of ozone measured in Dobson units. The term is, like the greenhouse effect, another PR term that underscores the political nature of the claims.
I pointed out to the Canadian Parliamentary Hearing on the matter that ozone is created by a photodisdassociation of oxygen by a portion of the ultraviolet section of sunlight. The assumption was, like with the greenhouse effect, that sunlight was constant. This meant you had no choice but to blame another agent for measured variations. They wanted a human agent and they had one already prepared from the lab experiments of Rowland and Molina. Like the IPCC they got a Nobel prize even though, as I understand, they did did not duplicate the temperature and pressure conditions high over Antarctica. Indeed, at that time they did not even know of the existence of Polar Stratospheric Clouds (PSC).
One human link between the ozone scam and the CO2 scam because of deep involvement with both was Susan Solomon.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Solomon
As Wikipedia notes; “Solomon was the first to propose the chlorofluorocarbon free radical reaction mechanism that is the cause of the Antarctic ozone hole.”
It also notes; “Solomon served as a contributing author for the Third Assessment Report[6] and Co-Chair of Working Group 1 for the Fourth Assessment Report[7] of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.[2]”
The Montreal Protocol was touted as proof the Kyoto Protocol could work, but as I pointed out to the Parliamentary committee neither China nor India were willing or required to participate.
Yes, the Ozone issue was a template for the greenhouse issue and just as falsely based and manipulated.
James Ard says: December 11, 2013 at 3:20 pm
The ozone hole hoax was good practice for becoming a climate skeptic. All of the same ingredients; media hype, end of the world predictions and a boogieman that actually benefited mankind.
Yep, a strong sense of Déjà vu, i.e.:
Time – Feb 17, 1992
I may be wrong about this, but it seems like I read that Freon (R-22) was too heavy to make it to the ozone hole and therefore unable to destroy the ozone hole. I do know this cheap refrigerant was banned and replaced by Puron (R-410a) which, by the way, is not pure because it is a very potent greenhouse gas.
I do know this, soon after Freon was banned I read about studies which showed how the ozone hole was affected by the angle of the sun. Then I believe I read something here on WUWT that how the ozone hole was only discovered when satellites started monitoring it and the assumption was the hole was man-made.
An attempt by somebody to ‘debunk’ this aspect; it would appear that the patents for such actually ran out in the 1950’s:
“R-12 Retrofitting: Are we really doing it because DuPont’s patent for Freon® ran out?”
http://www.imcool.com/articles/aircondition/refrigerant_history.htm
.
This might explain the rather strange statement the IPCC team members made, that they have a problem communicating “the science”.
They do sound bewildered and frustrated, as their methods worked so well in the ozone scare, perhaps they do not understand why the CO2 scare is failing so miserably.
The longer the ozone hole persists the more it looks to me that we the public were stampeded into the Montreal Protocol on emotion not science.
For the personal gain of a few agitators.
Same methods with CO2, no baseline measurements, imaginary effects and extending verification timelines into the future, every time nothing changes.
Yup, beginning in Part One “The Air above us”, in Chapter 3 tilted “Stratospheric Ozone and The “Hole”” on page 28 where the subtitle reads: “Now You See it; Now You Don’t” …
.
Kind of like trying to compare land survey measurement where the measurements, old and new, have no benchmarks nor any common, i.e. joint benchmark system by which to make a comparison. Therefore the old and the new are equally rubbish.
Not to worry.
CFC’s like CO2 have nothing to do with the physics of the problem.
btw: Luuza from luuzaville Hansen showed his face today for the Fart-iers of UgoFysics but behind massive security and quarantine. I did not attend. Heard from others he was slurring and miss-pronouncing words and otherwise showing his majesty navy ship a garbage scow of ill repute. Serves ’em right. Costing the AGU the entire top floor of the Marriott, tickets to the Seahawks-49ers game, [trimmed uncalled for] and demanding Exec-level Fed pay scale per hour and health benefits and 401(k) and 403(l) retirement entitlements.
Likely our dues will increase to $100 in 2014 to cover the scandal.
One day the membership will wake up and realize that the AGU President can’t blame Vietnam and agent orange for her “disabilities” any more.
[Yes, you’re angry. Watch your language nevertheless. Mod]
Occam’s Razor at work:
We have two competing hypotheses:
1) Most of the “ozone-depleting” chemicals are produced in the Northern Hemisphere. They would have to travel almost half-way around the Earth to get to the stratosphere above Antarctica, where they do their dastardly deed (but not until they arrive in the vicinity of the South Pole).
2) In his epic work on natural climate and natural climate change, the late Marcel Leroux wondered about Mt. Erebus. It would seem that this volcano has been in almost continuous eruption, for at least several hundred years (spanning the time humans have known about the existence of Antarctica). Now, Mt. Erebus is almost directly under the center of the south polar ozone “hole”.
Last time I checked, various compounds of Chlorine were constituents of volcanic gasses.
So, which is the simpler hypothesis?
Forget CO2, CFCs and whatever as this is worse than any catastrophists have thought of-
http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/travel/world/scientists-have-revealed-the-supervolcano-lurking-beneath-yellowstone-national-park-is-twice-as-big-as-previously-thought/story-fni0bxo5-1226781381769
We need all the resources we can lay our hands on to concrete over this lot and fast.
It’s very hard to make policy when changes and outcomes can be decades away. of course, that leads to panic and that’s what the climate change debate is mainly comprised of – panic on the one hand and ‘wait and see’ on the other. Either way – we’re doomed!
It begins (Fair use excerpt for discussion purposes):
So, worst case, take the 1935 date and add 20 years (patent lifetime) and the result is 1955. The patent, if valid in 1935, would have expired
in 1955 (if not before because of an earlier patent filing/grant date).
.
ALLRIGHT ! Let’s bring back R-22 ( . .or do I have that wrong, is it R-12) instead of R-134, for our automobiles, and get the price back donw to $1 per can or so . . .
. .geeez, I remembering looking into this, having to go to the Library to pull articles on the ozone over Antarctica, research by Dr. Dobson, who if I recall correctly, the ‘Dobson Units’ of ozone were named after, realizing this CFC scare was total BS.
Then with the Global warming, thinking that the ozone scare was a ‘warm-up’ to the CAGW garbage ( . .and an article by W. Happer of Princeton seemed to confirm that ( . .I KNOW i saved it as a link somewhere – just can’t find it now . . ).
WE’ve got to put an end to all this alarmism real soon . . .
… this part choked again …
It begins:
and the last part:
So, worst case, take the 1935 date and add 20 years (patent lifetime) and the result is 1955. The patent, if valid in 1935, would have expired
in 1955 (if not before because of an earlier patent filing/grant date).
.
The CFC-induced ozone hole issue was what got my skepticism started. I was working in a research lab at the time this started getting in the news. Had a physicist on staff who did his thesis on work with CFC’s and ballons. He thought it was all a bunch of hooey, but went along for the funding. Yes, there is an ozone hole at the poles in the Winter and into the Spring until sunlight returns and starts splitting oxygen atoms again. As it was ever thus.
The CFC caused Ozone depletion scare was brought to us by the same people that created the DDT scare and then went on to create the CO2 / AGW scare. People with NO scientific ability and an agenda to STOP the progress of western civilization.
The thinning of bird egg shells was caused by Lead ( mostly Tetra ethyl lead ) contamination.
The Ozone hole is a feature of polar circulation and has always existed.
Man made Global Warming is caused by manipulation of the local environment and test regimes by man. CO2 has nothing to do with it.
Science has been overrun by agenda driven propagandists. GIGO pg
I’m still trying to figure out how Freon that is heavier than air was able to climb into the sky and continue to climb through less and less dense air and then travel from the northern hemispere to the South Pole.
[Reply: Two words: Brownian motion. ~mod]
This is the same problem over and over again. Make short term measurements of complex long term phenomena and extrapolate to disaster. It would be like a one dimensional being attempting to describe a three dimensional apple – completely ludicrous but we see these “experts” do it time and again.
On DDT, it is little wonder that pelicans had problems with it and have now recovered – people were dumping it everywhere in the post war (WWII) era. All that really needed to happen with DDT is a tightening up of label usage instructions, education of the user populations, and harsh penalties for off-label usage. As it stands now, an awful lot of preventable malaria cases occur that could have been stopped with a very targeted use of DDT.
TalentKeyHole Mole says:
December 11, 2013 at 7:09 pm
Kind of like trying to compare land survey measurement where the measurements, old and new, have no benchmarks nor any common, i.e. joint benchmark system by which to make a comparison. Therefore the old and the new are equally rubbish.
==============
It was never about the measurements, only the intent of the lands borders as described.
Surveyors are good at measuring, land title(s) are a whole other matter.
“Good fences make good neighbors.” (Robert Frost)
Care to try for another analogy, cus this one hits a nerve.
(benchmark is a term used in determining elevations, not boundaries).
Why rubbish ?, how precise do you want your measures , of the imprecise legal descriptions of the property transferred ?
Does anyone remember that the UV was supposed to reach the earth via that ozone hole over the Arctic. If you think about it that is impossible. Radiation from the sun is passing that area at a tangent and would have to do a 90 degree turn to reach even Tasmania. I don’t believe that is possible. The hole in the ozone layer was a hoax like AGW. It was just practice, getting their act together for the main event.
JPM
DocattheAutopsy – AFAIK you are correct in thinking that there never was anything that the ozone hole had to recover from. Add in climate madness, DDT, useless wiggly light bulbs and mandatory unreliables, and the world’s need for a dose of reality has rarely been greater.
Bill_W says:
December 11, 2013 at 4:30 pm
I have my doubts about the DDT story as well, but pelicans have definitely come back in LA and I think elsewhere. Has anyone seen explanations of this that do not involve DDT? I have not looked into the papers that linked DDT to weak shells, but have been meaning to.
———————-
Hi Bill,
The problem with Rachel Carson’s construction of the pesticide problem is that DDT was not the only pesticide being used. Also introduced after the Second World War were a whole class of pesticides based on the nerve gases (organophosphate-derivatives) invented by IG Farben’s scientists around the time the war was beginning. Modifications of these led to pesticides like Aldrin (dieldrin), malathion, parathion and several others.
These were sprayed with great enthusiasm across the cotton fields of the south, and have been documented to have poisoned agricultural workers. Men flying crop dusters tended to have life-ending accidents with a much higher frequency than men piloting other airplanes. Even a light breeze can carry pesticide aerosols up to 15 miles away.
With such a cocktail of toxins being flung around the countryside, I cannot understand why Carson became fixated on DDT when there were so many possible culprits the the disappearance of birds. Probably researchers looking for DDT traces in raptor eggs did not bother controlling for other pesticides because they already knew the source of the problem.
It sounds like I don’t need to repeat the sentiment that maybe CFCs have nothing to do with the hole. But I must ask: do they want me to believe, living in Australia, where the sun shines from the north, that I get burnt because the sun rays swing around to the south, through the ozone hole, and then come roaring up the Antarctic Ocean to my little patch down under? I don’t think so!
Billyjack says:
December 11, 2013 at 8:01 pm
I’m still trying to figure out how Freon that is heavier than air was able to climb into the sky and continue to climb through less and less dense air and then travel from the northern hemisphere to the South Pole.
Individual gas molecules are not affected by buoyancy forces like a stone or a tree in water. By diffusion, gas molecules emitted in one place on Earth can end up anywhere, given enough time. It is not as if Freon somehow decides to go from the northern hemisphere to the southern hemisphere. It is just that it diffuses all over the place, but when it encounters ozone and extremely low temperatures, it may cause reactions that do not occur in warmer places.
If gases were to react to buoyancy, then an ozone molecule of O3 would promptly fall to Earth since its mass of 48 is higher than the average mass of air molecules which is 29 since it is composed of 78% N2 (mass 28) and 21% O2 (mass 32).
Perhaps laws and tightened enforcement against hunting them? The US started taking species protection a lot more seriously beginning in the 1960s.
Pelicans fly in straight lines, sit still on the water, and I imagine they would be very easy to shoot.
Ozone holes come and go. There are, as far as I understand it, almost entirely a natural event. Certainly there has been scientists that supposedly researched this as a man-made phenomena, but as usual with modern versions of science, they mostly had an agenda to satisfy.
Yes, molecular collisions will keep differently-massed molecules well mixed until the air is much more rarefied. But molecular weight does play a role, especially with heavier molecules like Freon-12 (molecular weight 133). Getting such heavy molecules into the stratosphere requires a lot of anti-gravitational diffusion.
Also, look at this video of the movement of carbon monoxide, with sources locations in populated areas similar to those of CFCs. Not much crosses the equator, much less gets to the Antarctic.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap010709.html
scarletmacaw says:
December 11, 2013 at 9:56 pm
“Pelicans fly in straight lines, sit still on the water, and I imagine they would be very easy to shoot.”
=====================
Get us a close up (shootable) shot of a pelican in the wild, and we’ll talk 🙂
I’ve been within 3-400 yards of a flock in a nature preserve, the shot might skip off the water even if it was low 🙂
Is there a way to post a personal picture here? I have a photo of a pelican sitting on the water about 20 ft. away. Of course that one was probably used to people and maybe even got a free fish every now and then. No doubt pelicans would have been a lot harder to get close to in the days when they were hunted.
I remember Ronald Reagan signing Montreal Protocol in the 80’s. Then the theory, or scare du jour, was that CFC’s emitted in the northern hemisphere were accumulating over the southern pole. Given ozone is created and destroyed constantly and is diamagnetic I found the claim to be very dubious.
But here in Australia he is being praised as some accidental climate change warrior.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/how-ronald-reagan-won-an-unlikely-battle-against-climate-change-and-why-the-world-should-follow-his-example-now-20131210-2z2pt.html
scarletmacaw says:
December 11, 2013 at 10:31 pm
===========
ok, when I fished on lakes in northern Minnesota, we couldn’t (not that we tried ) get within 100 yards of a pelican, they would leave.
Where was yours ?
This explains the logical fallacy of the CFC scare quite well.
http://www.ourcivilisation.com/ozone/king.htm
“Newly discovered greenhouse gas ’7,000 times more powerful than CO2′”
Cool, I’m always looking for IR stimulant gases that the greens haven’t banned yet.
vigilantfish says:
December 11, 2013 at 8:48 pm
Bill_W says:
December 11, 2013 at 4:30 pm
I have my doubts about the DDT story as well, but pelicans have definitely come back in LA and I think elsewhere. Has anyone seen explanations of this that do not involve DDT? I have not looked into the papers that linked DDT to weak shells, but have been meaning to.
———————-
Hi Bill,
The problem with Rachel Carson’s construction of the pesticide problem is that DDT was not the only pesticide being used. Also introduced after the Second World War were a whole class of pesticides based on the nerve gases (organophosphate-derivatives) invented by IG Farben’s scientists around the time the war was beginning. Modifications of these led to pesticides like Aldrin (dieldrin), malathion, parathion and several others.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Interesting how people focused on DDT. It probably was a focus In Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring”. However when I read it in the mid 60’s and wrote an engineering term paper on it, my ‘Take Away’ was concern over organophosphates. I got the bit on DDT and birds eggs, but when I read the book, did some research, I ended up focussing on the potential damage from the misuse or overuse of organophosphates. In addition, the interaction between organochlorines and organophosphates was thought to be a possible big problem (that is still being researched: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0300483X12002260 ) The combination of the two chemicals is thought to enhance neuro disruption, emulate estrogens, endocrine and other hormonal issues along with our old friend cancer and lung problems. It’s 46 years since I wrote that term paper and they are still studying. It’s why I look like an astronaut when I go out to spray fields. I guess it’s like Ozone depletion and AGW – we don’t really know except we have to appear to be doing something. Isn’t that what they told us in management school? “Lead, follow, or get out of the way.” Politicians have to appear to be taking action as they only have 3 to 5 years to convince us that we should re-elect them.
Wow, this thread is making me cynical.
Well, off to bed to rest up to shovel some more AGW tomorrow.
I have in the back of my mind the memory of reading an article wherein one of the originators of the ban CFC campaign, a chemist, admitted that actually the reactions proposed as the method for ozone destruction simply could not take place. Alas, it was one of those articles that I failed to archive or bookmark – it was some time ago now. Does anyone else remember this, or am I mistaken?
This issue is an example of the complete ignorance displayed by many people from both sides of the AGW argument.
I have been involved in studying this for over 20 years, right from the time I was told I couldn’t use the common refrigerants that I was used to using, to today where people assert that the whole thing was a hoax, and the Montreal Protocol was unnecessary.
I consider myself an amateur historian and when I was first confronted with the problem of the Ozone hole, I had my doubts about its cause and origin so I began researching the history. I learned that the first time it was known about was during the International Geophysical Year (IGY) of 1957-58. At the time it was not known what caused it or even how significant it was. Although the presence of the ozone hole was known about, it wasn’t until a study published by Farman, Gardiner and Shanklin in Nature, 1985, that the so-called ‘discovery’ of the hole was acknowledged. One interesting thing about that study was that data of the actual measurements of the Ozone layer began in 1978 with the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS). So, the seven years from 1978 to 1985, when the study came out, showed that the hole was increasing in size. Subsequent data from TOMS showed that the hole continued to increase in each subsequent year.
Hypothesis’ abounded about what the cause could be. Examination of the atmospheric chemistry showed that, while ozone is created on a continual basis by the photochemical reaction of oxygen with UV light, chlorine acted as a catalyst in the destruction of ozone and as a limiting factor in the amount of ozone in the atmosphere. A catalyst acts by continuing a chemical process without being destroyed or removed by the reaction, so as long as chlorine was present in the atmosphere, the destruction of ozone would continue, and would increase if the amount of chlorine in the atmosphere increased. As several people pointed out, chlorine is present in large quantities due to the presence of sodium chloride in the oceans, as well as in volcanic emissions. That accounts for the ‘natural’ presence of chlorine and demonstrates that the hole was probably always present. The problem is that the hole increased in size, which would indicate that the amount of chlorine in the atmosphere increased beyond what was natural. What was the cause of this increase?
In this case the most obvious source for the increase of chlorine was anthropogenic in origin – specifically Chlorinated Fluoro Carbons – (CFCs). CFCs are doubly implicated, because, not only are they a source of chlorine, but they are very stable molecules, with a long residence time in the atmosphere, where, due to mixing, they can reach the stratosphere to interact with ozone on a long term basis.
At this point, I have to state that I was originally very skeptical about the role of CFCs in the Ozone hole – for exactly the same reasons as many of the people responding to this article have stated. The evidence of the chemical reactions involved changed my opinion about the role of CFCs, and I became convinced that they were contributing to the decrease in the ozone layer. I was still not convinced (and remain that way) of the total effect that CFCs have on the size of the hole, because, it was subsequently learned that the lower temperatures at the south polar regions were the reason that the ozone hole in Antarctica was always larger than the one in the Arctic.
This becomes the point where we talk about the Montreal Protocol. Since CFCs are clearly a contributor to the decrease in ozone, it now becomes about what to do with CFCs. At this point I have to say that the typical overreaction to threats occurred. The Montreal Protocol took an extreme point of view that CFCs should be banned. Although I don’t agree with their conclusion, I am forced to go along with their decision. To this end, the results of their decision are correct – CFC concentrations have reduced and ozone concentrations have increased. The big thing is, that because of the residence time of CFCs in the atmosphere, and the contributing factor of low temperatures, the absolute results of the Montreal Protocol will not be seen in the size of the ozone hole in Antarctica until 2030.
Much like the current global warming ‘hiatus’ – actual results from this will not be known immediately and must wait until a good proportion of the current subscribers to this blog are dead.
I’m sorry it this doesn’t agree with some people’s prejudged opinions about the ozone hole and the Montreal Protocol, but the information is freely available on the internet if you are willing to spend the time to investigate. The final thing is that the Montreal Protocol, despite its incorrect analysis, was a success in halting the increase in the size of the hole. Whether the hole will decrease in size to its natural limits remains to be seen.
Thanks for your review of the path leading to the Montreal statist extreme overreaction . I think the banning of asthma inhalers for a gram or two of CFCs is misanthropic tyranny .
Particularly because , whatever rate of destruction or removal of O3 , it remains the case that it is the dissociation of O2 which is the reaction which absorbs the sun’s UV . The depletion only occurs , or ever will occur over the sunless winter poles . It will never affect human populations — or even penguins .
And as Barrie Sellers , December 12, 2013 at 8:00 am
According to other research CFC’s have no effect on the ozone hole. This is caused by solar activity.
I am pleased to see “Hoax” and “ozone hole” used in the same sentence.
It looks like we are REALLY strarting to see some very significant changes in global ice particularly Antarctic and Global
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.recent.antarctic.png
I am placing my bets that Arctic will return to, and go beyond average by Feb 2014
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.recent.arctic.png
If the trend in Antarctic continues like this for another 2-3 years this will become a very serious issue and be the portent of a major ice age. Maybe its time world governments be advised of this worrying trend most likely linked to Solar actvity or natural cycles.
Owen in GA says:
December 11, 2013 at 8:06 pm
“As it stands now, an awful lot of preventable malaria cases occur that could have been stopped with a very targeted use of DDT.”
I’ve recently read about an African farmer complaining that he can’t sell his organic Sesame as organic to European organic food importers if he uses DDT indoors to protect his family.
Maybe the hidden goal of the European Greens is really to wipe out excess population. European Greens claim they have nothing against indoor usage of DDT for Malaria protection but at the same time do everything they can to stop its usage.
As I understand it, & I am only a humble Chartered Structural Engineer, the hole is nothing of the kind, that it is actually merely a “thinning”, & that there are several of them but the “lesser spotted variety” don’t get a look in! Also as several of you guys have mentioned none of the “holers” have answered the basic question, & I repeat ad nauseum, how do they know that it has not always been there? The answer is that they simply don’t know, we are applying the fabled “Precautionary Principle”!
What is coming through loud and clear right across the blog world is the destruction of the century old respect for science as modern science’s ‘blatant corruption which is being created by the desire of opportunists in science to both gather fame and recognition to themselves as well as wealth and influence and power to their own persons and the small and usually quite incestuous scientist insider groups they are a part of and hang out with.
The corruption of basic science is mostly limited to a few specialized science disciplines so far. Science disciplines such as climate science being by far the worst, although the social sciences such as psychology with it’s Lewendownskys is closer to quackery even than even much of climate science and thats not saying much for the integrity of climate science and it’s practitioners.
The increasing disillusionment with science by a very considerable and increasing section of science layman followers is becoming like water on a stone. It doesn’t seem to be having any effect but over time that water will wear away and destroy that hard stone.
So it is with the reputation and respect for science and not just the most corrupt disciplines in science but the cynicism about scientists and their, increasingly obvious [ thanks to the internet,] ulterior and in some cases apparent nefarious motives that has become a highly visible characteristic of much of some specific disciplines in science today is destroying the image and respect for all of science as well as for scientists of all persuasions.
This reduction in respect and in some examples an outright contempt for some science disciplines and the scientists in those disciplines is now filtering down from the interested science aficionado’s to the tax paying public.
And the politicals will follow as the opinions amongst the public harden as more and more totally bogus and outright lies by scientists on some supposed future catastrophic event are shown for what they are, just a beat up by some third rate self opinionated little upstart who has got himself / herself a few letters after their name, called themselves scientists and now believe they are of a status and a level of superior intelligence that gives them the rights to instruct everybody else on what dictates they are to follow,
The public are increasingly awake to those self promoting opportunists who are now starting to create some serious credibility problems right across science of all disciplines
That increasing contempt for much, [ not all as some scientists are deeply respected and most definitely should be held in deep respect ] of today’s science can be very clearly seen in all the posts above and right back through the posts of numerous other science based blogs regardless of which side of a scientific fence the commenter is seated.
On the so called Ozone hole which is not a hole but a reduced region of stratospheric ozone which despite the hoo haa about UV effects is the equivalent of the changes in the amount of UV an American would get in NY compared to a the amount of UV they would get in say Florida or a bit further north of there.
There is a comment way back in time somewhere from a source I can no longer recall, [ a lousy recommendation I know, ] that the Japanese prior to WW2 knew from their radio propagation work in the South Pacific as they prepared for a future naval war in the Pacific, that there was something unusual occurring at high atmospheric levels [ HF radio propagation ] over the almost completely unexplored Antarctic continent of those times.
The Japanese unlike the Germans who kept a lot of their records intact right through to the surrender, destroyed a great deal of their research and documentation to try and minimise any war crime trials and to deny the victors any grounds on which the highest levels of the Japanese military could be made accountable for and so this information if it existed was quite likely destroyed towards the end of WW2.
As to the corruption in the science surrounding the Ozone Hole affair , perhaps Proff James Lovelock of Gaia fame and also the inventor of an instrument to measure ozone levels from the ground so is well qualified to comment on the Ozone Hole science should have a final say.
This interview was with The Guardian;
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2010/mar/29/james-lovelock
James Lovelock on the value of sceptics and why Copenhagen was doomed
[ quoted ]
Lovelock’s reaction to first reading about the stolen CRU emails [he later clarified that he hadn’t read the originals, saying: “Oddly, I felt reluctant to pry”:
[ Lovelock ]
I was utterly disgusted. My second thought was that it was inevitable. It was bound to happen. Science, not so very long ago, pre-1960s, was largely vocational. Back when I was young, I didn’t want to do anything else other than be a scientist. They’re not like that nowadays. They don’t give a damn. They go to these massive, mass-produced universities and churn them out. They say: “Science is a good career. You can get a job for life doing government work.” That’s no way to do science.
I have seen this happen before, of course. We should have been warned by the CFC/ozone affair because the corruption of science in that was so bad that something like 80% of the measurements being made during that time were either faked, or incompetently done.
Fudging the data in any way whatsoever is quite literally a sin against the holy ghost of science. I’m not religious, but I put it that way because I feel so strongly. It’s the one thing you do not ever do. You’ve got to have standards.
[ end of quote ]
So the ozone hole “crisis” wasn’t. The claims of a dangerous ozone hole were false. The policies to deal with it were a waste of billions of dollars. Hmmmm….that sounds like something else the environmentalists are doing to us. What can that be?
The crucial point is not whether DuPont’s patent for Freon had expired but whether the gas for which they certainly had a living patent could have its cheaper and more effective rival eliminated by political fiat. It required only some convenient scare to come along.
On DDT and the enviro loons role in forcing not only DDT off the market but also for their role on preventing the life saving Golden Rice from being released since it’s development in 2000.
All because it was a GMO using genes from corn, one of the world’s largest crops as well as from a very common soil, bacteria to create Beta Carotene which the body uses in Vitamin A production which itself is an essential in the retaining the vitality of the human immune system.
The consequences of preventing the release of Golden Rice are that around 10 million mostly little kids die each year from preventable diseases in the Asian rice eating regions.
With the UN’s estimate of 40 to 50 million preventable deaths from malaria since the banning of DDT, a ban now ignored as numerous countries have given the finger to the western elitist greenpeaces of this world, plus another 30 million preventable deaths due to the all out political campaign by the enviro killers against the release of Golden Rice has arguably caused as many as 70 to 100 million preventable deaths amongst the most vulnerable on this earth over the last 40 years.
Add to this the tens of thousands of the poor and elderly in Europe who are dying each recent harsh winter from the effects of cold due to them no longer able to both eat and heat. Due again to the cost of renewable energy and the all out drive by the enviro-loons to force western civilisation off of reliable fossil fueled energy onto the totally useless, grossly inefficient and unreliable and increasingly unaffordable renewable wind and solar energy and with NO perceivable reduction in CO2 or effects on the climate.
Greenpeace, the WWF and all their other leech like enviro NGO’s are arguable the greatest mass destroyers of human life this planet has ever seen.
And they couldn’t give a damn!
For the DDT story
The Killer Elite ; http://capitalresearch.org/pubs/pdf/OT0705.pdf
For the Golden Rice project ; http://www.goldenrice.org/
The ozone ‘hole’ was a scientific horror to many people, from the moment it was discovered by satellites. They didn’t give a crap that it’s a natural and persistent annual phenomenon. They didn’t give a damn that they had zero understanding of it’s mechanisms. The sky was falling, and they weren’t about to waste an opportunity to declare a crisis, and then to proscribe equally imaginary mitigations.
“In 1995, the year Molina and Rowland were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery of the CFC-ozone depletion link” from
The Skeptics vs. the Ozone Hole
By Jeffrey Masters, Ph.D. — Director of Meteorology, Weather Underground, Inc.
Why should they not return them along with Al Gore.
Mickey Reno says:
December 12, 2013 at 4:49 am
The ozone ‘hole’ was a scientific horror to many people, from the moment it was discovered by satellites.
=========
It was not discovered by satellites. It was discovered by a man named Dobson in 1956 with an instrument made by him. That is why it is measured in Dobson units.
I promised myself I would give preaching my alternate to CFCs as ozone hole creaters as it doesn’t seem to even get read. Anyway here goes: the only gas in the atmosphere that is magnetic is O2 (strongly paramagnetic) – it is attracted to the poles. ALL OTHER GASES ARE DIAMAGNETIC – REPULSED BY A MAGNETIC FIELD. If I am correct that this explains the ozone hole, then there should also be an N2 hole, CO2 hole and a Noble Elements hole at the poles (north pole is confounded by busier outside weather incursions). As a corollary, we should find the atmosphere at the equator somewhat impoverished in O2 and enriched in all the others. Probably biological activity confounds this simple picture but we could use noble gases as a tracer and some atmospheric analysis of the ozone hole to see if it is richer in O2 and impoverished in all other gases, of course including ozone. Any physicists out their to comment? Perhaps they could even calculate the effect. Another test is to see if the ozone hole fluctuates with the earth’s magnetic field strength. Also, I believe ozone has been separated from O2 using magnetics.
Chris @NJSnowFan says:
December 11, 2013 at 3:39 pm
——————–
The article states that chlorine levels in the atmosphere are falling.
With regard to the “Ozone Hole” and CFCs (as well as other refrigerants), it seems that there is a money trail similar to CAGW. The fact that almost all of the replacement refrigerants are terribly flammable, poisonous, inefficient, or all three just makes the situation worse. The automakers here in Europe have been going round and round with France and the European Union because the latest proposed refrigerant can create (or result in) hydrogen fluoride in an accident where fire is involved. Rescue workers would have to don Hazmat equipment before approaching the wreck(age).
Ironically, CO2 is being proposed as a replacement, although there are some technical hurdles left to resolve before a solution can hit the market. It’s being described as a safe alternative, which contradicts the suggestion that CO2 is a pollutant.
Somehow I think that in cases like these, the solution is worse than the problem.
For an interesting look at refrigeration technology, and rapid Barbecue ignition
(see the Dave Barry column) have a look at George Gobel here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_H._Goble…he’s done a lot of interesting research.
el gordo says:
December 11, 2013 at 3:35 pm
There was a multinational that did very well out of this scam, but its name eludes me.
as others mentioned..Dow..
and it was Enrons first go I believe at a wonderful moneyscam on credits etc.
and ken lays methods for taxing or charging was then later used for the carbon scam..
or so I have gathered. correct me if I’m wrong:-)
At AGU, NASA says CFC reduction is not shrinking the ozone hole – yet
==============
The ozone must be hiding in the deep oceans along with the warming.
The reality is that scientists need to get out of the lab more often and have a look around. We see a polar vortex on other planets and it has nothing to do with man made CFC or chlorine.
What you are seeing is water going down the drain. Cold air is sinking a the poles, combined with the rotation of the planet sets up a vortex that scrubs the atmosphere at the poles. You end up with a “hole” at the poles, depending on the temperature gradient, with a collar of increased concentrations surrounding the hole.
https://www.google.ca/search?q=polar+vortex+venus+images
https://www.google.ca/search?q=polar+vortex+saturn+images
https://www.google.ca/search?q=polar+vortex+jupiter+images
https://www.google.ca/search?q=polar+vortex+titan+images
https://www.google.ca/search?q=polar+vortex+earth+images
Where did all the ozone go? these pictures tell the tale:
http://www.jhu.edu/~dwaugh1/gallery/ozone_rdf.jpg
http://www.jhu.edu/~dwaugh1/gallery/crista-anim.gif
The hole is not a result of ozone being destroyed. It is a result of ozone being transported from the poles to lower latitudes.
Warmies and the media like to post images of (ozone) holes, but the bottom line is if & how much UV levels have changed at the surface underneath. Why have we not seen this? If surface UV levels haven’t changed significantly, then all the handhole-wringing is useless.
I thought I had read (I think here at WUWT) that an analysis of isotopes in the ice record revealed that the ozone hole long preceded satellite observations of the phenomena. That the ozone hole must have existed long before human use of CFCs.
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2006AGUFM.U32A..05M
Bill_W says:
December 11, 2013 at 4:30 pm
I have my doubts about the DDT story as well, but pelicans have definitely come back in LA and I think elsewhere. Has anyone seen explanations of this that do not involve DDT? I have not looked into the papers that linked DDT to weak shells, but have been meaning to.
Maybe a change in their food supply also.
“The Pacific Sardine stocks began to disappear in the late 1940s due to
the compounding impacts of natural oceanographic cycles and fishing pressures.
Fossil evidence going back 1,700 years suggests that Pacific Sardine abundance
naturally fluctuates over time. These cycles average about 60 years, with a
period of recovery lasting on average 30 years. The most recent period of
abundance began in the late 1970s.”
http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/education/voicesofthebay/pdfs/oceanpowerpointnotes.pdf
With news about the PDO shift leading to less sardines, check back on pelican numbers in a few years.
I’ve pointed this out before – and maybe others have too – ozone is an unstable substance with a half life dependent on the temperature: at -30 degrees C the half life is 3 months. And there’s your ozone hole. Always has been there always will be there CFCs or no CFCs.
Has anyone ever tracked the size of the ozone hole against ENSO? Might be interesting.
Sebastian Inlet, near Vero Beach FL.
So CO2, CFCs, and DDT are all controlled by conspiracy plots? I’m not sure skeptics will ever be more than a fringe opinion with this line of thinking.
DD More: I think the LA that Bill_W was referring to is the US State of Louisiana. I am not sure the Pacific sardine would have had much impact on Gulf of Mexico feeding birds – though I leave open the fact that I can be – and have been in the past – very wrong. The waters of Louisiana were very polluted prior to the clean water act, which did almost all of its good in the first 5 years of its existence and has since turned into a bureaucracy job creation bill and economy killing regulation machine. DDT probably had very little to do with Louisiana wildlife problems as it was just one of thousands of chemicals available to wreak havoc due to very little controls placed on the Louisiana petrochemical refining industries’ waste streams prior to the 1970s.
You present a very good summary.
The correlation between CFC production and the decrease in ozone levels at the south pole do provide evidence that CFCs are the cause. But we don’t have any measurements before CFCs were introduced into the atmosphere, so there’s no definitive proof.
There is one other comment I’d like to make. As far as I know, no one has ever actually detected CFCs in the stratosphere. I remember reading that a satellite was launched to measure CFCs in the stratosphere, but got a null result and the results were then suppressed. I don’t know whether or not that story is true.
Brian,
Obviously you are not a scientific skeptic [the alternative is a True Believer].
Skeptics simply require testable proof. That’s all. So far, there is no proof that “carbon” causes global warming. In fact, there is only solid evidence that global warming causes a rise in CO2.
You need to straighten out your thinking. Think: testable evidence. If it’s not there… be very skeptical.
ferd berple says:
December 12, 2013 at 6:46 am
“Where did all the ozone go? these pictures tell the tale:
http://www.jhu.edu/~dwaugh1/gallery/ozone_rdf.jpg
http://www.jhu.edu/~dwaugh1/gallery/crista-anim.gif
The hole is not a result of ozone being destroyed. It is a result of ozone being transported from the poles to lower latitudes.”
ferd berple, you have come closest to recognizing an element of my hypothesis (my post of 603 am):
” the only gas in the atmosphere that is magnetic is O2 (strongly paramagnetic) – it is attracted to the poles. ALL OTHER GASES ARE DIAMAGNETIC – REPULSED BY A MAGNETIC FIELD. If I am correct that this explains the ozone hole, then there should also be an N2 hole, CO2 hole and a Noble Elements hole at the poles (north pole is confounded by busier outside weather incursions). As a corollary, we should find the atmosphere at the equator somewhat impoverished in O2 and enriched in all the others. Probably biological activity confounds this simple picture but we could use noble gases as a tracer and some atmospheric analysis of the ozone hole to see if it is richer in O2 and impoverished in all other gases, of course including ozone.”
It has to have some effect and it is measurable and testable.
dbstealey says: “Obviously you are not a scientific skeptic [the alternative is a True Believer].”
There is another alternative: conspiracy theorist. I am not a “True Believer” or a conspiracy theorist.
Brian,
Nor, it seems, are you a scientific skeptic.
Upon which empire was it said that ‘the sun never set’? Perhaps it was the desire to communicate with her majesty’s fleet ’round the world which spurred this research:
“On the Diurnal Variations of the Electric Waves Occurring in Nature, and on the Propagation of Electric Waves Round the Bend of the Earth”
By W. H. Eccles, D.Sc, A.RC.Sc
Proceedings of the Royal Society, vol. 87A, pp. 79-99; August 13, (1912).
https://archive.org/details/philtrans03035940
Also an interesting read:
“The Relation of Radio Sky-Wave Transmission to Ionosphere Measurements”
NEWBERN SMITHt, 1938, NONMEMBER, I.R.E
http://tf.nist.gov/general/pdf/2416.pdf
.
This sounds remarkably like Dr. Benjamin Spock, only his line was “my first book was wrong, but my new book has it right.” Sort of like “earlier simulations were off the mark, but OUR simulation has it right, so rest assured, CFCs are still the devil. Psst. Hand me another grant please?”
I thought you were going to work out the ‘forces’ exerted on these molecules, then compare that force with the force that the winds exert?
.
Barrie Sellers says:
December 12, 2013 at 8:00 am
I’ve pointed this out before – and maybe others have too – ozone is an unstable substance with a half life dependent on the temperature: at -30 degrees C the half life is 3 months. And there’s your ozone hole. Always has been there always will be there CFCs or no CFCs.
Not to mention that the abundance of ozone is inversely proportional to the amount of incident UV radiation (that is the touted purpose of ozone after all, isn’t it…to protect us from harmful UV radiation?). Having said that, don’t the polar regions experience long periods of either complete darkness or long periods of sunlight? Wouldn’t those changes in incident UV radiation also have a direct impact on the abundance of atmospheric ozone present? No CFC mechanism required to explain variations in ozone concentrations.
scarletmacaw says:
December 11, 2013 at 10:13 pm
Thank you for that. At the following, I saw two seemingly contradictory statements:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_monoxide
“Carbon monoxide concentrations are both short-lived in the atmosphere and spatially variable.
Due to its long lifetime in the mid-troposphere, carbon monoxide is also used as tracer of transport for pollutant plumes.”
I am not sure what to make of them. But is it possible that the CO disappears too fast for many of the molecules to make it to the southern parts?
Gary Pearse says:
December 12, 2013 at 9:33 am
the only gas in the atmosphere that is magnetic is O2 (strongly paramagnetic) – it is attracted to the poles
I could be wrong, but that does not sound right to me. Consider a compass for example. The needle orientates itself to point to the magnetic north pole, but the compass as a whole does not move.
Now suppose we have lots of extremely tiny magnetized iron filings that we disperse into the air. They would orientate themselves, but any net attraction to the north pole would be minimal. Yes, the one side is closer to the north pole than the other and due to the inverse square law, attraction would in theory be stronger than repulsion, but air currents and Brownian motion would be way stronger in my opinion. And gas molecules of O2 are even smaller, so I do not believe that it would make a difference, even if O2 were ferromagnetic.
The “ozone hole” is a ntural occurrence, every late winter i the SoHem, August, starrts with one. Its extension or not depends on the condition in the troposphere.
wbrozek says:
December 12, 2013 at 11:10 am
Gary Pearse says:
December 12, 2013 at 9:33 am
the only gas in the atmosphere that is magnetic is O2 (strongly paramagnetic) – it is attracted to the poles
“I could be wrong, but that does not sound right to me.”:
I believe you are wrong; from wiki on the mag field:
“The intensity of the magnetic field is greatest near the magnetic poles[1] where it is vertical. The intensity of the field is weakest near the equator where it is horizontal.”
And regarding separating O2 from diamagnetic gases:
http://pe.org.pl/articles/2012/7b/11.pdf
“he data indicate that the gas species O2 and NO are strongly paramagnetic; this is in contrast to most other gases, which are weakly diamagnetic, and to a few ones that are weakly paramagnetic. Hence, O2 and NO might be economically separated from gas mixtures, such as air or flue gases, by passing the mixture through a magnetic field having a strong gradient.”
Note that diamagnetic materials are inert; they are actively repelled by the magnetic field. Also, Brownian movements are random and air currents away from the poles will move the other gases away faster and toward the poles will further retard O2.
_Jim says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:33 am
Gary Pearse says December 12, 2013 at 9:33 am
…
” the only gas in the atmosphere that is magnetic is O2 (strongly paramagnetic) – it is attracted to the poles. ALL OTHER GASES ARE DIAMAGNETIC –
I thought you were going to work out the ‘forces’ exerted on these molecules, then compare that force with the force that the winds exert?”
Jim, I already noted that the arctic has much more intrusive weather from the outside and so it would confound the results somewhat. Such a tossing off of the outside-the-box thinking of mine is not much of a contribution. I have also provided the tests for falsifying this. How else would you explain an N2 hole, noble gases hole and CO2 hole if there is one. Also, although the equatorial region would have biological effects on CO2, look for higher N2 and noble gases there and explain it to me in some other way. Then you have made a contribution.
Oops should say: Note that diamagnetic materials are NOT inert
Just think you’re paying for every single government employee spammage of this drivel laced with voodoo passed off as “Maybe I’m wrong but you, shut up.”
After all what do you know about science. Didn’t the government tell you pot is heroin?
Well: since you don’t understand climate and you don’t know pot from heroin I think it’s best if the government goes ahead and takes over all your medications.
After all your track record is so terrible you can’t be trusted. The government’s going to run your life, and you’re going to pay government employees to do it. If you don’t the full weight of government is going to come down on you,
until you realize who is here,
to serve whom.
@dbstealey
Why not?
Perhaps at the equator; near one or the other poles it could ‘move’ were it not for the friction of the ‘mount’ normally enclosing the compass. Also recall that iron filings will attach themselves to a magnet if allowed to (say, if the attractive force is allowed to overcome the force of gravity)
Also bear in mind this factor is operative:
Also see: “Practical Information on the Deviation of the Compass: For the Use of Masters and Mates of Iron Ships”
Possibly this falls In the category of ‘things I never knew” (and didn’t need to!)
.
Gary Pearse says:
December 12, 2013 at 11:46 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_magnetic_field
“Earth’s surface ranges from 25 to 65 micro Tesla”
In your Table 2, the range is from 25 to 750,000 milliT. So the lowest number here is about 1000 times stronger than Earth’s magnetic field. Is that right? And the highest is 10 million times larger if my math is right. Furthermore, this is all still theoretical according to the title.
If normal diffusion overcomes gravity to allow CFCs to reach the stratosphere, then I see no way that gases in the atmosphere will be affected by any magnetic field as low as Earth’s.
How do you mentally go about simply turning a ” can you show me your work* ” request into ” you’re just engaging in con spiracy theories ” meme? Is there a handbook available to do this sort of thing?
.
.
.
* Since these governments are bound and determined to taxing the living daylights out of us BASED on that work by those so-called scientists! I wanna see their work before forking over my hard-earned wages! Perhaps, you don’t …
.
_Jim says:
December 12, 2013 at 1:11 pm
Also recall that iron filings will attach themselves to a magnet if allowed to (say, if the attractive force is allowed to overcome the force of gravity)
Very true. But would oxygen molecules attach themselves to this same magnet which has a force much stronger than the magnetic force of Earth?
re: wbrozek says December 12, 2013 at 1:24 pm
…
Very true. But would oxygen molecules attach themselves to this same magnet which has a force much stronger than the magnetic force of Earth?
I’m not far enough along on that theory to comment one way or the other. I’m thinking like you above that other factors prevail in the case of the earth and its poles, however.
.
scarletmacaw says:
December 12, 2013 at 9:00 am
There is one other comment I’d like to make. As far as I know, no one has ever actually detected CFCs in the stratosphere. I remember reading that a satellite was launched to measure CFCs in the stratosphere, but got a null result and the results were then suppressed. I don’t know whether or not that story is true.
Very interesting point.
It is known that low temperature are causing “ozone holes”. There has been one recently in the north due to very cold temperatures in the Arctic:
http://www.iceagenow.com/Cold_weather_destroying_ozone_in_the_Arctic.htm
“The ozone layer has seen unprecedented damage in the Arctic this winter due to cold weather in the upper atmosphere,”
With the Antarctic colder it is simply logical the “hole” is there bigger in winter:
“Usually in cold winters we observe that about 25% of the ozone disappears, but this winter was really a record – 40% of the column has disappeared,” said Dr Florence Goutail from the French National Centre for Scientific Research.
The alarmism was great at the time:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2012/04/ozone-hole-and-global-warming-evolution.html
and ignored the fact that the “hole” was discovered in the 50s:
http://junkscience.com/2012/04/08/exclusive-british-polar-research-in-crisis/
“Dobson described an ozone monitoring program that began at Halley Bay in 1956.
When the data began to arrive, “the values in September and October 1956 were about 150 [Dobson] units lower than expected. … In November the ozone values suddenly jumped up to those expected. … It was not until a year later, when the same type of annual variation was repeated, that we realized that the early results were indeed correct and that Halley Bay showed a most interesting difference from other parts of the world.” ”
And natural part of the process was not known & ignored:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v403/n6767/full/403295a0.html
“A strong source of methyl chloride to the atmosphere from tropical coastal land”
http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070924/full/449382a.html
http://junksciencearchive.com/Ozone/ozone_seasonal.html
So, there might something to debunk with the “ozone hole” story even if the chemistry of CFC might fit, I think that some CFC’s should be discovered in the stratosphere to confirm the theory, else…
A couple of years ago, it was finally admitted that the “science” that claimed that CFCs caused ozone destruction in the upper atmosphere over Antarctica was false and fabricated by DuPont to promote an expensive replacement they had lined up already under patent. Now, a bit over 17 years later, they say, “We bad. We were wrong.”
The ozone hole is driven by the solar irradiance interacting with nitrogen in the atmosphere. It’s totally unrelated to CFCs.
_Jim,
the article you cited claiming that the patent for CFCs expired in the 50s appears to be wrong and misleading. Wikipedia appears to have it right:
Got any patent numbers we can look up to confirm the dates on any of this?
You know, patents back to the 30’s are available online today …
.
scarletmacaw says:
December 12, 2013 at 8:42 am
===============
Thanks for that reply, they seem rather skittish on “Lake Of The Woods” in Minnesota.
Home to the northern-most point in the contiguous United States, due to a badly written legal description that the surveyors had to follow 🙂
As I stated above, that was “An attempt by somebody to ‘debunk’ this aspect;” … I haven’t been able to nail or confirm everything as to ‘fact or fiction’, but, if R-12 was being manufactured in 1935 as claimed (and it would have to have been patented then or prior to 1935) THEN in 1955 that patent would have expired (20 some years after the 1935 date) … does that make sense? This is simple logic – patents ‘run’ (are effective, if paid up) for a period of time (IOW they have an ‘expiration’ date, if you will.)
You’ll also notice, per Wiki’s own words: “The critical DuPont manufacturing patent ” which is a patent titled “Process for fluorinating halohydro-carbons“, and NOT a patent for R12 or Freon (Freon appears to be a trademark, a different entity) per se. Does that make sense? IOW it’s a patent on how a particular process is performed, to wit, fluorinating halohydro-carbons – a manufacturing process that is covered by patent acting to protect Du Pont’s intellectual property as a manufacturer, as it says.
Wiki, BTW, needs cross-checking just as any other source up to the original documents (like the patent cite.)
Are things completely cleared up? I don’t think so, not yet … certain dates need to be verified yet.
.
Gary Pearse says:
December 12, 2013 at 9:33 am
ferd berple, you have come closest to recognizing an element of my hypothesis (my post of 603 am):
==========
Gary you may well be onto something. When I first read you post it didn’t register at all. How can air be magnetic? It isn’t something you learn in school.
But one of things that has really bugged me about arctic warming is the rapid shift in the earth’s north magnetic pole. It is easy to dismiss this as coincidence, but on what basis?
I had thought it might be an interaction of the magnetic field with the solar wind, but now you have given us another previously unrecognize mechansim. A paramagnetic material (O2) moving in a magnetic field may well separate the O2.
Werner Brozek says:
December 12, 2013 at 1:15 pm
I see no way that gases in the atmosphere will be affected by any magnetic field as low as Earth’s.
===========
my fridge magnets have a stronger magnetic field locally, but they don’t deflect compasses all over the earth.
re: Khwarizmi says December 12, 2013 at 4:49 pm
I think this is the patent you seek (note: in the following CCl2Fl2* represents Freon R-12):
– – – – – – – – –
Title: Manufacture of halo-fluoro derivative of aliphatic hydrocarbons, US 2007208 A
Publication date . . Jul 9, 1935
Filing date . . . . . Feb 24, 1931
Priority date . . . . Feb 24, 1931
Inventors . . . . . . . Henne Albert L, Midgley Jr Thomas, Reed Mcnary Robert
Original Assignee . . Gen Motors Corp
https://www.google.com/patents/US2007208
.
.
* CCl_sub2_Fl_sub2
ferd berple says:
December 12, 2013 at 5:31 pm
my fridge magnets have a stronger magnetic field locally, but they don’t deflect compasses all over the earth.
True, but if you held your fridge magnet near a compass on your kitchen table, the compass would move according to your fridge magnet. So if Earth’s magnetic field is expected to attract O2 molecules, the fridge magnet should do so much more. But if the fridge magnet cannot do so locally (unless you have proof to the contrary) then why should Earth be expected to do so globally?
Thanks _Jim,
I’ll have a look at that later today. It was the method of manufacture, not the product, that was subject to the patent.
Meanwhile, here’s a brief summary of Sagan’s weird and interesting version of the history:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/20/the-handsomest-fox-in-the-henhouse/#comment-1367758
Cheers.
Just to tie a ribbon on it, the announcement of dichlorodifiuoromethane (R-12) in a white paper in 1930:
“Organic Fluorides as Refrigerants”
Thomas Midgley Jr., Albert L. Henne
Ind. Eng. Chem., 1930, 22 (5), pp 542–545
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ie50245a031?journalCode=iechad
The more or less ‘formal’ incorporation of dichlorodifiuoromethane as a constituent part of an ‘invention'” via this patent:
– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Title: “Heat transfer” US 1833847 A
Publication number US1833847 A
Publication type . . . Grant
Publication date . . . Nov 24, 1931
Filing date . . . . . . . Feb 8, 1930
Priority date . . . . . . Feb 8, 1930
Inventors . . . . . . . . Henne Albert L, Mcnary Robert R, Midgley Jr Thomas
Original Assignee . . Frigidaire Corp
– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
We find the ‘meat of the nut’ in the claims section:
I got there in a roundabout way using these works:
1. http://www.fluoride-history.de/p-freon.htm
2. http://www.scs.illinois.edu/~mainzv/HIST/bulletin_open_access/v31-2/v31-2%20p66-74.pdf
Number 2 contains a lot of background and history and corrects some of the ‘myths’ surrounding the reason and development of the first “Freon”.
.
re: Khwarizmi says December 12, 2013 at 7:14 pm
This might be of interest, too, given your last:
THOMAS MIDGLEY, JR., AND THE INVENTION OF CHLOROFLUOROCARBON
REFRIGERANTS: IT AIN’T NECESSARILY SO
By Carmen J. Giunta, Le Moyne College
http://www.scs.illinois.edu/~mainzv/HIST/bulletin_open_access/v31-2/v31-2%20p66-74.pdf
This generally applicable paragraph buried towards the end of the above document particularly caught my eye:
The above cited doc also has a rich ‘references and notes’ section.
.
Brian says: mumble, mumble, mumble. crap, mumble mumble,……
December 12, 2013 at 8:50 am
Just wondering how in Brian’s mind that critiquing bad science equates to conspiracy theory ideation.
(This is getting old .. second submission of this particular post since the first ‘bounced’)
re: Khwarizmi says December 12, 2013 at 7:14 pm
This might be of interest, too, given your last:
THOMAS MIDGLEY, JR., AND THE INVENTION OF CHLORO FLUORO CARBON
REFRIG ER ANTS: IT AIN’T NECESSARILY SO
By Carmen J. Giunta, Le Moyne College
http://www.scs.illinois.edu/~mainzv/HIST/bulletin_open_access/v31-2/v31-2%20p66-74.pdf
This generally applicable paragraph buried towards the end of the above document particularly caught my eye:
The above cited doc also has a rich ‘references and notes’ section.
.
(Try a 2nd post on this one too as the 1st disappeared right promptly into lala-land)
Just to tie a ribbon on it, the announcement of di chloro di fluoro methane (R-12) in a white paper in 1930:
“Organic Fluorides as Refrig erants”
Thomas Mi dgley Jr., Albert L. Henne
Ind. Eng. Chem., 1930, 22 (5), pp 542–545
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ie50245a031?journalCode=iechad
The more or less ‘formal’ incorporation of di chloro di fluoro methane as a constituent part of an ‘invention'” via this patent:
– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Title: “Heat transfer” US 1833847 A
Publication number US 1833847 A
Publication type . . . Grant
Publication date . . . Nov 24, 1931
Filing date . . . . . . . Feb 8, 1930
Priority date . . . . . . Feb 8, 1930
Inventors . . . . . . . . Henne Albert L, Mcnary Robert R, Midgley Jr Thomas
Original Assignee . . Frigidaire Corp
– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
We find the ‘meat of the nut’ in the claims section:
I got there in a roundabout way using these works:
1. http://www.fluoride-history.de/p-freon.htm
2. http://www.scs.illinois.edu/~mainzv/HIST/bulletin_open_access/v31-2/v31-2%20p66-74.pdf
Number 2 contains a lot of background and history and corrects some of the ‘myths’ surrounding the reason and development of the first “Freon”.
.
Oh – thanks guys / m o d s! _Jim
john robertson says:
December 11, 2013 at 6:57 pm
They do sound bewildered and frustrated, as their methods worked so well in the ozone scare, perhaps they do not understand why the CO2 scare is failing so miserably.
There is something that might explain it. Civilization can get along without CFCs, but not without fossil fuels.
ROM says:
December 12, 2013 at 3:59 am
The corruption of the natural sciences was preceded and foreshadowed by the corruption of economics. We used to think that, short of outright dictatorship, the physical sciences were immune to such manipulation. We were wrong.
u.k.(us) says:
Good fences make good neighbors.” (Robert Frost)
Frost only quoted this saying, and not with approval. Read the poem.
Since Svensmark published his evidence for cosmic ray chemistry in the atmosphere, i’ve wonered if the chloroflurocarbons have been given a bad rap. …. maybe it should be revisited in light of the
new knowledge of the muon produced high energy electrons in the troposphere …
Werner Brozek says:
December 12, 2013 at 1:15 pm
Gary Pearse says:
December 12, 2013 at 11:46 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_magnetic_field
“Earth’s surface ranges from 25 to 65 micro Tesla”
“In your Table 2, the range is from 25 to 750,000 milliT. So the lowest number here is about 1000 times stronger than Earth’s magnetic field. Is that right? And the ”
Werner, It is not a strong field, but please lets agree that there is an effect. Happily I found a demonstration on You Tube by a Harvard prof. The only thing is the prof doesn’t appear to understand the diamagnetic aspect. N2 is not just unattracted to the magnet, it is REPELLED by the magnet. So if you have molecules attracted to the magnet AND molecules repulsed by a magnet, there will be some degree of separation.
Also, you may or may not be aware of a phenomenon known as a ferro fluid:
“In a gradient field the whole fluid responds as a homogeneous magnetic liquid which moves to the region of highest flux. This means that ferrofluids can be precisely positioned and controlled by an external magnetic field. The forces holding the magnetic fluid in place are proportional to the gradient of the external field and the magnetization value of the fluid. This means that the retention force of a ferrofluid can be adjusted by changing either the magnetization of the fluid or the magnetic field in the region.”
https://www.ferrotec.com/technology/ferrofluid/
It causes the particles (read oxygen) to align and they too become a magnetic body that further repels its diamagnetic friends. I found this effect occurring when trying to separate fine ferromagnetic grains from very fine grained paramagnetic rare earth mineral grains in a liquid. The ferromagnetic grains immediately magnetized the liquid and a captured its neighboring weaker paramagnetic grains and removed them from the suspension with them, even though the rare earth minerals were too weakly magnetic to be attracted to the outside field applied.
re: Gary Pearse says December 13, 2013 at 5:54 am
I got no ‘bite’ on this comment linked below the first time (5 days ago?) regarding gas ‘reaction’ to magnetic fields, so I point back to it now:
. . . http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/07/ipccs-report-on-climate-change-myths-realities/#comment-1495479
In particular, the paper below which used a really strong magnetic field to affect the sublimation of CO2 from a block of dry ice:
. . Effects of Gradient Magnetic Fields on CO2 Sublimation in Dry Ice
. . http://iopscience.iop.org/1742-6596/156/1/012029/pdf/1742-6596_156_1_012029.pdf
Also note the other paper was looking at the mixing ratio between O2 and N2 and at heights above 100km where some ‘separation’ or settling out (stratification) may occur as opposed to lower altitudes where turbulent vertical mixing keeps the two well mixed:
. . http://acmg.seas.harvard.edu/people/faculty/djj/book/bookchap2.html
_Jim says:
December 13, 2013 at 6:57 am
re: Gary Pearse says December 13, 2013 at 5:54 am
“I got no ‘bite’ on this comment linked below the first time (5 days ago?) regarding gas ‘reaction’ to magnetic fields, so I point back to it now:”
Thanks Jim and sorry I seem to have missed it. Yes, I accept that the idea should be fleshed out with other data and, indeed, some calculations. Although I have used ferro, para and diamagnetic phenomena in the mineral processing field, I am someway out of my depth to present calculations of this effect in the atmosphere – a medium that seems to be even giving physicists a lot of trouble. I proposed a long time ago that given uranium’s significant paramagnetism, it could be cleaned out of affected water using a high gradient “mesh” or steel wool magnetic filter. I was told the idea should be tried and possibly patented – but like the atmospheric situation, I didn’t have the resources to do much about it, except to mention on as thread somewhere when Fukushima reactors were breached that the water could be pumped from the site through a magnetic filter.
Regarding data, the first round should be devoted to see if there is difference in gas species content around the south pole, the temperate and equatorial regions. I didn’t know that NO is also paramagnetic before some small research I did in response to questions. Maybe it is more abundant at the South Pole, too. Ive mentioned confounding aspects or weather and biology in the equatorial zone wrt CO2 and O2 but one should find elevated N2 and noble gases there and a hole for all atmospheric gases except O2 and NO at the south polar region. Once again, I would be obliged to defer such research to someone else. It would be nice if someone reading this could put there hands on whatever data there is. After that, I would also have to rely on a physicist or engineer familiar with the details of magnetic behavior in such a setting to get a “measure” of the effect – tiny or significant.
Thanks for your interest and links.
The ozone hole over Antarctica has always had too large seasonal changes for it to be anything other than mainly natural cycle. What, if any human affect on it by CFC’s, is too small to even notice.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/polar/gif_files/ozone_hole_plot.png
I’m betting there has always been a ozone hole (area of weak concentration) and we cant distinguish any natural changes with unnatural.
scarletmacaw says:
December 12, 2013 at 9:00 am
Mike Tremblay says:
December 12, 2013 at 1:14 am
You present a very good summary.
The correlation between CFC production and the decrease in ozone levels at the south pole do provide evidence that CFCs are the cause. But we don’t have any measurements before CFCs were introduced into the atmosphere, so there’s no definitive proof.
There is one other comment I’d like to make. As far as I know, no one has ever actually detected CFCs in the stratosphere. I remember reading that a satellite was launched to measure CFCs in the stratosphere, but got a null result and the results were then suppressed. I don’t know whether or not that story is true.
CFCs are routinely measured in the stratosphere, here’s a graph.
http://www.epa.gov/ozone/science/images/FIG-FAQ02.JPG
This paper describes measurements made as early as 1975!
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF01636907#page-1
re: Phil. says December 13, 2013 at 10:45 am
Post was kinda thin on specifics there Phil .. one resource is sitting behind a paywall.
.
“That assumption is like trying to understand what’s wrong with your car’s engine without lifting the hood.”
Sorry, I just can’t leave that go Susan! This must be magic, eh?
Welcome to the 90’s ↘
Thanks for the links. I’m curious as to what they actually say since the first link is an undescribed graph and the second is just an abstract. How were the measurements made in 1975?
The first link appears too smooth to be a graph of actual measurements, so I suspect it is a model.
Gary Pearse says: December 12, 2013 at 9:33 am
ferd berple says: December 12, 2013 at 6:46 am
Yes and yes. Here is helpful image that shows how the Northern Polar Vortex formed and created a Northern “Ozone Hole” in 2011:
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/facts/images/2011-02-22_LNH.png
For reference the images above are:
And this:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
NOAA – National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
NOAA – National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
The source of this images, this NASA page on Polar Vortices;
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
is very informative, however it is confounding that they demonstrate the mechanics of the natural formation of “Ozone Holes” within Polar Vortices and then claim on this page;
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/facts/NH.html
that:
If there is a physical process that adequately explains the existence of Ozone Holes, why do we need a supplemental CFC based chemical process? How big would the ozone hole be if CFCs didn’t exist? It would be the same size, as ozone hold size depends on how big the Polar Vortex is and how deep it penetrates into the atmosphere.
There is also another important physical process in play within the Polar Vortex, is that
Air towards the top of the stratosphere has lower concentrations of ozone;
NOAA – National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
As such, when this “air from very high altitudes descends vertically through the center of the vortex” it displaces the air below it, decreasing the concentration of ozone within the Polar Vortex. The combination of the low pressure area formed by the centrifugal force of the Polar Vortex and the air from very high altitudes with lower concentrations of ozone that descends vertically through the center of the vortex, creates the “Ozone Hole”.
“Alan the Brit says: December 12, 2013 at 3:18 am
As I understand it, & I am only a humble Chartered Structural Engineer, the hole is nothing of the kind, that it is actually merely a “thinning”,
Yes:
& that there are several of them but the “lesser spotted variety” don’t get a look in!
Yes, NASA refers to them as “Ozone Mini-Holes”;
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/facts/miniholes_NH.html
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
NOAA – National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
Above are:
Also, Polar Vortices and their “Ozone Holes” can split, i.e. in this September 2003 paper, “Ozone Forecasts of the Stratospheric Polar Vortex Splitting Event in September 2002″:
http://www.knmi.nl/~eskes/papers/jas1039_eskes_pp.pdf
Most CFCs were generated in the Northern Hemisphere with its much larger population and industry. So you’d expect a larger hole over the NORTH pole. But by some magical process not yet modelled, or identified by the UN, most of the CFCs generated in the northern hemisphere have filtered downhill, past the equator and down to the south pole where they have wreaked havoc on the south pole ozone.
Is there a new phenomenon where CFC compounds are repelled by the earth’s north pole and attracted to the earth’s south pole?
Gary Pearse says:
December 13, 2013 at 5:54 am
Thank you for that. While it may have some effect in theory, I think the key is from Jim’s site where it says:
“Turbulent mixing thus maintains a homogeneous lower atmosphere.”
Perhaps the effect is noticeable very high up where the molecules are very spread out. Gravity seems to play a role very high up as well, but lower down, other processes dominate.
DocattheAutopsy says: December 11, 2013 at 3:53 pm
Correct me if I am wrong, but didn’t the ozone hole exist in the first satellite records
Yes, the first satellite to measure Ozone concentrations was the Nimbus-7 TOMS Instrument, i.e.:
In support of this assertion they offer these globes that:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
NASA – Earth Observatory – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
NOAA – National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
Here’s:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
The Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography at Old Dominion Universityy – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
Also, not satellite, but:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="578"]
The Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography at Old Dominion Universityy – Click the pic to view at source[/caption]
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/statistics/meteorology_annual.png
_Jim says:
December 13, 2013 at 11:31 am
re: Phil. says December 13, 2013 at 10:45 am
Post was kinda thin on specifics there Phil .. one resource is sitting behind a paywall.
Unlike all the the posts on here that erroneously assert that no such measurements have been made with no cites to back them up!
scarletmacaw says:
December 13, 2013 at 3:06 pm
Phil. says:
December 13, 2013 at 10:45 am
Thanks for the links. I’m curious as to what they actually say since the first link is an undescribed graph and the second is just an abstract. How were the measurements made in 1975?
The first link appears too smooth to be a graph of actual measurements, so I suspect it is a model.
You’d be wrong.
It doesn’t take much to work back from the fig to the original url:
http://www.epa.gov/ozone/science/myths/heavier.html
“Source: World Meteorological Organization, Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion: 1998, WMO Global Ozone Research and Monitoring Project – Report No. 44, Geneva, 1998.”
The paper was not behind a paywall for me but there are these things called libraries where you can access the papers without paying.
As it says in the paper the measurements were made using GC with electron capture detection.
Here’s another paper discussing more recent satellite measurements (figs 6 and 7):
http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/12/28733/2012/acpd-12-28733-2012.pdf
‘Thin’ is still thin, Phil, no matter your assertions to the contrary, and adds little to nothing to the discussion; failure to ‘make your case’ with very thin soup is a reflection on Phil, not _Jim.
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dsystem says:
December 13, 2013 at 8:22 pm
Most CFCs were generated in the Northern Hemisphere with its much larger population and industry. So you’d expect a larger hole over the NORTH pole. But by some magical process not yet modelled, or identified by the UN, most of the CFCs generated in the northern hemisphere have filtered downhill, past the equator and down to the south pole where they have wreaked havoc on the south pole ozone.
Is there a new phenomenon where CFC compounds are repelled by the earth’s north pole and attracted to the earth’s south pole?
If you actually took the trouble to read about the subject you’d learn that due to the colder air PSCs form above the antarctic but not often over the arctic and the heterogeneous reaction with ozone takes place on those. That is why the hole over the antarctic is more significant.
_Jim says:
December 14, 2013 at 10:03 am
_Jim says December 13, 2013 at 11:31 am
Post was kinda thin on specifics there Phil .. one resource is sitting behind a paywall.
Phil. says December 14, 2013 at 6:40 am
Unlike all the the posts on here that erroneously assert that no such measurements have been made with no cites to back them up!
‘Thin’ is still thin, Phil, no matter your assertions to the contrary, and adds little to nothing to the discussion; failure to ‘make your case’ with very thin soup is a reflection on Phil, not _Jim.
Actually I’ve added a website and two papers to the discussion, _Jim has added nothing but two content free comments.
I remeber in the last solar minimum in 2008, there was a huge ozone hole over the Arctic and probably the Antarctic as well. At that time, it was suggested that cosmic rays were the cause. The Montreal Protocol was just a hoax played on the world by Dupont. No need to ban Freon except that Dupont’s patent had run out.
It is interesting to notice how many people have recognized – nay condemned – the ability of a company to benefit from the use of environmental legislation, mandates, and bans in order to sell their own replacement technology.
But the same people cannot understand how AGW falsehoods allow countless companies peddling worthless wares such as CFLs and wind turbines to sell unwanted garbage to unwilling customers.
Do you have something in mind? Just curious what exactly it is you’re driving at. To date, anything pointing in that direction (re: CFCs) has been conjecture with no actual supporting ‘facts’.
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Eve says December 14, 2013 at 8:12 pm
..
No need to ban Freon except that Dupont’s patent had run out.
What patent, Eve? Everybody says this, no one seems to be able to actually source ‘facts’ for this conclusion.
Call it an Urban Myth then …
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Is it that Phil cannot read? Proceeds to inflate his own meager contribution?
[trimmed. Mod]
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@_Jim, my meaning is in the second paragraph, not the first.
“But the same people [making the claims against DuPont] cannot understand how AGW falsehoods allow countless companies peddling worthless wares – such as CFLs and wind turbines – to sell unwanted garbage to unwilling customers.”
MKelly, thanks for the correction. Dobson, of course discovered the annual (and natural) diminishing ozone levels in the polar regions during their respective sunless winters.
But it’s also fair to say that when the TOMS satellite measured the extent and level of ozone depletion in the 70s, there was little common understanding of the scope. Because of the large extent of depletion, there was a wave of popularization and alarmism that did NOT occur when Dobson observed ozone depletion in the 1950s. This is the phenomenon I was describing as ‘discovery.’ Perhaps it was an unfortunate choice of words.
Ironically, when the satellite era “discovery” of the ozone hole became part of the pop culture, pop science almost universally ignored the lessons of Dobson’s research. They immediately began to manufacture an anthropogenic attribution as the cause. Had most atmospheric scientists properly internalized Dobson’s work, at the time of the satellite measurements the so-called “ozone hole” would have been immediately explained to the world as a completely natural, annual event, perhaps somewhat larger than previously thought. The objective process would have been front and center, and policy makers would have been told that ozone levels fall rapidly when ozone is not refreshed by solar UV interactions in the atmosphere. We would not now be stuck with the current sad and stupid state we’re in, in which the CFC myth is still accepted by many people as the cause for the ozone hole.
Phil. says: December 14, 2013 at 2:15 pm
“If you actually took the trouble to read about the subject you’d learn that due to the colder air PSCs form above the antarctic but not often over the arctic and the heterogeneous reaction with ozone takes place on those. That is why the hole over the antarctic is more significant.”
Good news then. We only need to ban CFCs in the Southern hemisphere.
dsystem says:
December 15, 2013 at 1:15 pm
Phil. says: December 14, 2013 at 2:15 pm
“If you actually took the trouble to read about the subject you’d learn that due to the colder air PSCs form above the antarctic but not often over the arctic and the heterogeneous reaction with ozone takes place on those. That is why the hole over the antarctic is more significant.”
Good news then. We only need to ban CFCs in the Southern hemisphere.
As long as you can build a barrier to prevent the N hemisphere air crossing the equator, that might prove to be tricky as well as having unforeseen consequences!
Mickey Reno says:
December 15, 2013 at 6:25 am
MKelly, thanks for the correction. Dobson, of course discovered the annual (and natural) diminishing ozone levels in the polar regions during their respective sunless winters.
But it’s also fair to say that when the TOMS satellite measured the extent and level of ozone depletion in the 70s, there was little common understanding of the scope. Because of the large extent of depletion, there was a wave of popularization and alarmism that did NOT occur when Dobson observed ozone depletion in the 1950s. This is the phenomenon I was describing as ‘discovery.’ Perhaps it was an unfortunate choice of words.
It was the discovery of the increasing depth of the ozone hole starting around 1977 by Dobson’s colleagues led by Farman (using Dobson’s instruments), which was published in 1984 which showed the progressive ‘expansion’ of the ozone hole. NASA the went back and looked at their data and corroborated the British Antarctic Survey results.
Ironically, when the satellite era “discovery” of the ozone hole became part of the pop culture, pop science almost universally ignored the lessons of Dobson’s research. They immediately began to manufacture an anthropogenic attribution as the cause. Had most atmospheric scientists properly internalized Dobson’s work, at the time of the satellite measurements the so-called “ozone hole” would have been immediately explained to the world as a completely natural, annual event, perhaps somewhat larger than previously thought.
Completely wrong, Dobson’s research was taken on board and it was well known that there was a seasonal natural fluctuation, it was the amplification of the seasonal decline that needed to be explained.
The objective process would have been front and center, and policy makers would have been told that ozone levels fall rapidly when ozone is not refreshed by solar UV interactions in the atmosphere. We would not now be stuck with the current sad and stupid state we’re in, in which the CFC myth is still accepted by many people as the cause for the ozone hole.
No after how much you would like it to be it’s not a myth. There are several myths propagated in this thread though, such as: ‘no one has ever actually detected CFCs in the stratosphere’, ‘depletion only occurs , or ever will occur over the sunless winter poles’ (no, it’s in the spring), ‘Proff James Lovelock of Gaia fame and also the inventor of an instrument to measure ozone levels from the ground’, (he didn’t, that was Dobson, Lovelock invented the EC detector, which was used to measure stratospheric ozone), ‘I read that Freon (R-22) was too heavy to make it to the ozone hole and therefore unable to destroy the ozone hole’, and DuPont’s patents ran out!
You’re essentially saying that based on 20-30 years of limited research from the pre-satellite era, scientists understood all possible natural variations in the extent of the ozone hole. And any change from that level of understanding must be anthropogenically caused. Thank you for so nicely equating ozone hole alarmism with climate change alarmism, generally.
I use the word myth advisedly. I’m not claiming chemical reactions between CFCs and ozone don’t happen. I’m saying the evidence that anthropogenic releases of CFCs CAUSE the polar ozone holes are speculative and weak, and that natural variation in the ozone hole’s extent is not well understood. Yet, pop science continues to make the claim that CFCs significantly affect the polar ozone holes without clear evidence that shows clear connections between CFC levels (pre and post Montreal), and the size of the annual ‘holes.’ And, just as in climate change alarmism, future predictions of mitigation are vague, far off, and unmeasurable. Recent research and advocacy on ozone and CFCs offer two mutually exclusive results, on the one hand saying that CFCs will not be eliminated from the atmosphere until 2070, with measurable results probably not possible until 2025, and on the other hand, the Antarctic ozone hole has shrunk drastically in that last couple of years, likely as a result of CFC bans.
“I don’t know” is a perfectly acceptable scientific answer and I suggest ozone hole researchers start practicing saying it. But then, there’s far less research grant money when no crisis exists. Correlations between CFC alarmism and grant money are excellent.
Mickey Reno says:
December 17, 2013 at 8:11 am
Phil writes: … “Completely wrong, Dobson’s research was taken on board and it was well known that there was a seasonal natural fluctuation, it was the amplification of the seasonal decline that needed to be explained.”
You’re essentially saying that based on 20-30 years of limited research from the pre-satellite era, scientists understood all possible natural variations in the extent of the ozone hole. And any change from that level of understanding must be anthropogenically caused. Thank you for so nicely equating ozone hole alarmism with climate change alarmism, generally.
You’re showing you bias here, nowhere did I imply that. The observation of the seasonal decline needed to be explained, there was no requirement that it be due to anthropogenic causes. Subsequent measurements showed a negative correlation between CiO and ozone and the chemical reactions whereby CiO acts as a catalyst in the destruction of ozone were identified. So both a mechanism and a correlation have been experimentally determined. Only about 100,000 tonnes of CFC-11 were produced prior to Farman’s measurements starting in 1956 whereas over 8,000,000 tonnes were produced afterwards prior to 1992, and slightly higher values for CFC-12. So contrary to your assertion there is plenty of evidence of a direct connection between the release of CFCs and the loss of ozone over Antarctica.
Phil, your statement clearly implies what I inferred. And I am biased. I’m biased against assumptions of causality, when only correlations are in evidence. You should be, too.
Mickey Reno says:
December 18, 2013 at 12:58 pm
Phil, your statement clearly implies what I inferred.
Nowhere is this implied: “And any change from that level of understanding must be anthropogenically caused.”, that is your imagination.
And I am biased. I’m biased against assumptions of causality, when only correlations are in evidence.
There are more than correlations in evidence, there is a proven mechanism too.
Thank you for so nicely equating ozone hole alarmism with climate change alarmism, generally.
This is a fabrication by you, I presented scientific facts concerning the observations of Antarctic ozone depletion and made no reference to climate change!
Phil, I don’t dispute that a chemical mechanism exists, which I’ve already stipulated. I don’t even dispute that the mechanism MIGHT be in play over the polar regions. I’m saying that the existence of this process over the polar regions is not proven by a correlation.between the size of the hole and anthropogenic production of CFCs.
You’re dismissing ALL CAUSES of natural variations in the size of the ozone hole, when you don’t know the scope of natural (pre-CFC) variation. Some of those causes may be unknown to us. Some may depend on regional or local wind/weather patterns, some of which are also poorly understood. You have no evidence that makes it scientifically valid to do that. What you have is a hypothesis, ready for actual experiment and testing, and subject to falsification.
As for my claim that CFC alarmism mirrors global warming alarmism, I’ll stand by my statement. The full scope of natural variation is also dismissed far too casually in CAGW (ie. agenda based) science.
Mickey Reno says:
December 19, 2013 at 8:00 am
Phil, I don’t dispute that a chemical mechanism exists, which I’ve already stipulated. I don’t even dispute that the mechanism MIGHT be in play over the polar regions. I’m saying that the existence of this process over the polar regions is not proven by a correlation.between the size of the hole and anthropogenic production of CFCs.
There is far more corroborative evidence than that as outlined above.
You’re dismissing ALL CAUSES of natural variations in the size of the ozone hole, when you don’t know the scope of natural (pre-CFC) variation. Some of those causes may be unknown to us. Some may depend on regional or local wind/weather patterns, some of which are also poorly understood. You have no evidence that makes it scientifically valid to do that. What you have is a hypothesis, ready for actual experiment and testing, and subject to falsification.
On the contrary I have not done that, that’s your assumption. Winds, for example, are known to have an effect. Part of the chemical mechanism is that chlorine radicals are the catalytic agent and that ClO would be expected to be generated as the ozone is depleted. This is exactly what is observed, no ‘natural’ mechanism would do so.
As for my claim that CFC alarmism mirrors global warming alarmism, I’ll stand by my statement. The full scope of natural variation is also dismissed far too casually in CAGW (ie. agenda based) science.
That’s not what you said, you said “Thank you for so nicely equating ozone hole alarmism with climate change alarmism, generally”, thank you for confirming that it was your claim!.