To coincide with the upcoming “World Ozone Day 2014″ declared by the U.N. for September 16th, we have some “feel good” news coming out on the 25th anniversary of the Montreal Protocol
On September 10, an article written by Seth Borenstein of the Associated Press trumpeted a claim of good news with the headline: “Scientists say the ozone layer is recovering.” The basis for Borenstein’s headline is a statistical analysis:
For the first time in 35 years, scientists were able to confirm a statistically significant and sustained increase in stratospheric ozone, which shields the planet from solar radiation that causes skin cancer, crop damage and other problems.
…
From 2000 to 2013, ozone levels climbed 4 percent in the key mid-northern latitudes at about 30 miles up, said NASA scientist Paul A. Newman.
Later in the article, Borenstein cites this news as “one of the great success stories of international collective action in addressing a global environmental change phenomenon.”
Is it really?
Like many superficial claims made in the mainstream media, this one reveals a different story if you scratch ever so slightly below the surface. First, a bit of background on ozone depletion: ozone reduction in the upper atmosphere is said to be caused by a chemical interaction with the inert refrigerant chemical known as “chlorofluorocarbons,” or CFCs, which is found in the piping of millions of refrigerators and air conditioners worldwide. The loss of the ozone layer in the upper atmosphere will lead to normally reflected high-energy ultraviolet light reaching the Earth’s surface, causing more sunburns and skin cancer, disruption of ecosystems such as marine plankton and algae, and other photosynthetic biomass, with a large ripple effect.
The solution was to ban certain CFCs that were said to cause a loss of upper atmospheric ozone. Borenstein’s supposed “success story” hinges on a 1987 UN resolution called the Montreal Protocol:
The Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer was designed to reduce the production and consumption of ozone depleting substances in order to reduce their abundance in the atmosphere, and thereby protect the earth’s fragile ozone Layer. (Source)
The Montreal Protocol certainly seems rooted with good intentions. Yet, as with so many other things we see from the UN, the actual implementation — once the cocktail parties, the speeches, and the self-congratulatory claims are over — doesn’t quite fit the original intent or the claims of success. Just a few months ago on Dec 11, 2013, NASA issued a press release containing this statement:
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.
…
“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.” (Source)
Within the span of nine months, NASA issued statements claiming of atmospheric ozone that “signs of recovery are not yet present,” there is “large variability,” it is “stabilizing,” and now, that the ozone problem is “recovering”.
So which is it? The answer may lie in the relevant political science, not the atmospheric. The Montreal Protocol is 25 years old this year, having been entered into force in 1989. When such milestones are reached, there is always pressure to make some statement that the work of the UN actually made some sort of difference.
Importantly, neither China nor India was willing to or required to participate in the Montreal Protocol. That left them free to do whatever they wanted, and that is exactly what they did. In February 1989, the New Scientist reported that China had a plan in place to boost their production of CFCs up to 10 times the present level. And, it wasn’t until the summer of 2007 that China actually got around to banning the production of ozone-depleting CFCs. So there has not been much in the way of reduction from China. In fact, as reported by Walter Russell Mead in The American Interest, China used the UN-sponsored Kyoto Protocol to run an emission credits scam operation:
It appears that Chinese coolant manufacturers have been producing an excess of a harmful greenhouse chemical in order to dispose of it responsibly under the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). By using incinerators to cleanly burn off the chemical, HFC-23, these manufacturers were earning emission credits that they would in turn sell to developed world companies in order to help them hit their targets under the Kyoto Protocol.
This chicanery didn’t go unnoticed, however: the European Emissions Trading Scheme banned trade in those credits in May, and other working climate exchanges have said they’re going to follow suit. A very lucrative business for Chinese manufacturers is drying up very quickly, and they’re not taking it sitting down.
The EIA said an undercover investigation had shown that most of China’s non-CDM facilities were emitting HFC-23 already.“If all of these facilities [under the CDM] join China’s non-CDM and vent their HFC-23, they will set off a climate bomb emitting more than 2bn tonnes of CO2 equivalent emissions by 2020,” it said.
Thanks (in part) to financial incentives to destroy CFCs under the Kyoto Protocol, there are even more CFCs in existence (in China) than there were before. This might explain why, more than 15 years after the Montreal Protocol was put into effect by the UN, NASA reported in 2006 that the ozone hole over the Antarctic reached a record size:
“From September 21 to 30, [2006], the average area of the ozone hole was the largest ever observed, at 10.6 million square miles,” said Paul Newman, atmospheric scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. Newman was joined by other scientists from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in reporting that the ozone hole over the polar region of the Southern Hemisphere broke records for both area and depth in 2006. A little over a week after the ozone hole sustained its new record high for average area, satellites and balloon-based instruments recorded the lowest concentrations of ozone ever observed over Antarctica, making the ozone hole the deepest it had ever been. Source: NASA Earth Observatory
Or does it? Adding to the madness, now there is scientific uncertainty about the actual extent of the ozone problem as it relates to CFCs. More recent science has shown that the sensitivity of the Earth’s ozone layer might very well be 10 times less than was originally believed back in the 1980s when the alarm was first sounded. As reported in the prestigious science journal Nature, Markus Rex, an atmospheric scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Potsdam, Germany, found that the breakdown rate of a crucial CFC-related molecule, dichlorine peroxide (Cl2O2), is almost an order of magnitude lower than the currently accepted rate:
“This must have far-reaching consequences,” Rex says. “If the measurements are correct we can basically no longer say we understand how ozone holes come into being.” What effect the results have on projections of the speed or extent of ozone depletion remains unclear. (Emphasis added)
One of the biggest issues with the Antarctic ozone hole is that it is not a year-round event. It peaks at its worst during the long, dark Antarctic winter. Observations show that it is highly correlated to weather patterns — more so than to actual atmospheric CFC content. The cold, the lack of sunlight to form new ozone, and the circular wind pattern in Antarctica all conspire to reduce ozone without any help from CFCs at all. Fellow of the American Meteorological Society and co-founder of the Weather Channel Joe D’Aleo says he thinks that the Antarctic ozone hole might simply be a permanent feature of the Earth that we only discovered when we went looking for the posited ozone reduction:
The data shows a lot of variability and no real trends after the Montreal protocol banned CFCs. The models had predicted a partial recovery by now. Later scientists adjusted their models and pronounced the recovery would take decades. It may be just another failed alarmist prediction.
Remember we first found the ozone hole when satellites that measure ozone were first available and processed (1985). It is very likely to have been there forever, varying year to year and decade to decade as solar cycles and volcanic events affected high latitude winter vortex strength. (Source)
With the claim in the AP story of “statistically significant” success being just a tiny improvement at higher latitudes, about 4%, while the Antarctic ozone hole continues mostly unabated, one wonders if the UN claim of success is nothing more than taking credit for simple natural variability.
The ozone hole may be a process that has been around for ages, which we only were able to notice as a result of recent technology.
This article originally appeared as a special report to PJMedia
Added: Ozone hole animation – watch the ozone hole form when Antarctic winter sets in.
I remember reading a long time ago that the consequence of so-called man-made ozone reduction was equivalent to moving about 100 miles closer to the equator. I was living in Florida at the time and thought how crazy it was for all my neighbors of European decent to be worrying about ozone depletion when they intentionally exposed themselves to 10 times the ultraviolet radiation of their cousins back in the old country, by living so much closer to the equator!
Like climate change, the evidence is increasing that most of the fluctuations we see in the ozone layer are natural, and that the human impact is small to inconsequential. As Alan Caruba has been saying for years: “The Earth is fine. Save yourself!”
I could never actually accept all the scaremongering – it was more a case of “follow the money”
How fortuitous that DuPont – who had made a fortune manufacturing Freon just happened to have a new (monopoly mind you) set of chemicals HCFC’s and HFC’s able to save mankind. Oh and make a huge killing into the bargain
Andi
Gouge the middle-class, and price the poor, out of air conditioning, and refrigeration, for food. Now that’s an accomplishment worth celebrating!
If Seth Borenstein was a real journalist, that would make a serious story. Too bad he is just a propaganda mouth piece.
The infamous Ozone Hole subect is full of misunderstandings, pseudoscience, myths and wrong assumptions. Inside the Antarctic Polar Vortx there are several “holes”, one of them is Freon-1 as discoverede many years agbi by the joint program NASA/University of Wuppertall with the Crista-Spas satellite. They used the F-11 molecule as a marker for analyzing other molecules… but they found out there is a lack of F-11 molecules inside the polar vortex or in the entire Antarctica.
See what the chemistry inside the Vortex looks like, and then will start to put thing in their proper order:
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/images-52/vortex-1.GIF
Sorry, where in the lower left corner says Ozono (O) should read Chlorine (Cl)
The right graph is this:
http://www.mitosyfraudes.org/images-52/vortex-1.JPG
Yes, “the polar vortex can be considered a sealed chemical reactor bowl, containing a water vapor hole, a nitrogen oxide hole and an ozone hole, all occurring simultaneously (Labitzke and Kunze 2005)”
Interhemispheric Differences in Polar Stratospheric HNO3, H20, C10, and 03 – Santee, et al.[/caption]
http://books.google.com/books?id=B93SSQrcAh4C&lpg=PA283&ots=d0-uBRjmyI&dq=%22water%20vapor%20hole%22%20polar%20vortex&pg=PA283#v=onepage&q=%22water%20vapor%20hole%22%20polar%20vortex&f=false
There have been “measurements of low methane concentrations in the vortex made by the HALOE instrument on board the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite.” Rapid descent of mesospheric air into the stratospheric polar vortex, AGU 1993
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/93GL01104/abstract
“Simultaneous global measurements of nitric acid (HNO3), water (H2O), chlorine monoxide (CIO), and ozone (O3) in the stratosphere have been obtained over complete annual cycles in both hemispheres by the Microwave Limb Sounder on the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite. A sizeable decrease in gas-phase HNO3 was evident in the lower stratospheric vortex over Antarctica by early June 1992, followed by a significant reduction in gas-phase H2O after mid-July. By mid-August, near the time of peak CIO, abundances of gas-phase HNO3 and H2O were extremely low. The concentrations of HNO3 and H2O over Antarctica remained depressed into November, well after temperatures in the lower stratosphere had risen above the evaporation threshold for polar stratospheric clouds, implying that denitrification and dehydration had occurred.”
“There are no MLS measurements over Antarctica from mid-September through the end of October (20). By the time southviewing resumes on 1 November, chlorine over Antarctica has been largely deactivated. However, the 03 deficit that developed in September (4, 11, 12) persists. The deficits in gas-phase HNO3 and H20 also persist, with mixing ratio values less than 6 ppbv and less than 3 ppmv, respectively, throughout most of the vortex. Similar H20 values were measured by the UARS Halogen Occultation Experiment (HALOE) in mid-October 1992 (29). The strong PV gradient indicates that the vortex is still intact, inhibiting mixing between polar and midlatitude air. Lower stratospheric temperatures rose above the NAT PSC formation threshold the last week in September (30). The fact that gas-phase HNO3 and H20 values remain depressed long after the last PSCs would have been expected to evaporate strongly implies that irreversible removal (denitrification and dehydration) occurred at this level.”
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/267/5199/849.short
Here are the associated images of the Ozone, Nitric Acid and Water Vapor Holes:
[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500"]
Location the polar vortex depends on solar activity and the earth’s magnetic field.
Need to compare the distribution of ozone with the magnetic field of the earth, in order to understand the importance of cosmic and solar radiation.
http://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2012/09/south_atlantic_anomaly/11851889-1-eng-GB/South_Atlantic_Anomaly_node_full_image_2.jpg
http://exp-studies.tor.ec.gc.ca/tmp/25512297280de20090910.gif
Current anomalies in the distribution of ozone.
http://exp-studies.tor.ec.gc.ca/ozone/images/graphs/gl_dev/current_1.gif
For comparison, such was decomposition of ozone 12.09.2009 during solar minimum.
http://exp-studies.tor.ec.gc.ca/tmp/01520148440de20090912.gif
Tsar Bomba – NOx induced ozone depletion?
“Although simplistic fireball calculations predicted the fireball would hit the ground, the bomb’s own shock wave reflected back and prevented this. The fireball reached nearly as high as the altitude of the release plane and was visible at almost 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) away from where it ascended. The subsequent mushroom cloud was about 64 kilometres (40 mi) high (over seven times the height of Mount Everest), which meant that the cloud was above the stratosphere and well inside the mesosphere when it peaked.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsar_Bomba
Yes, well..
The ozone hole was the first case in which I actually knew what was really going on when the public was being paniced over an enviro problem. Acid rain made me suspicious, but wasn’t something I knew anything about.
Most of the legitimate ozone layer concern arose, however, from an error – specifically the sensor readings from a key satelite showed a real problem emerging very quickly; and that caused serious people some real concern. As it turned out, however, the thing’s orbit wasn’t circular -actually a rotationally asymmetric ellipsoid influenced by atmospheric heating having different effects during parts of its orbit. The result, since the sensors depended on reflected radiation, was to reduce readings in some area to near zero – hence the “wobbly top” picture that emerged of the ozone hole floating around the magnetic pole.
Oops! but by the time the people at JPL understood, the media was in full cry and couldn’t be corrected.
Thanks (in part) to financial incentives to destroy CFCs under the Kyoto Protocol, there are even more CFCs in existence (in China) than there were before.
No, there is more HFC-23 which is a greenhouse gas, not a CFC.
This might explain why, more than 15 years after the Montreal Protocol was put into effect by the UN, NASA reported in 2006 that the ozone hole over the Antarctic reached a record size:
No, it can’t since HFC-23 contributes no Cl atoms.
One of the biggest issues with the Antarctic ozone hole is that it is not a year-round event. It peaks at its worst during the long, dark Antarctic winter.
No, it peaks in the spring when the sun returns to the antarctic.
If the ozone hole is caused by CFC, why is it more pronounced in Antarctica than Arctic? My guess is the hole is caused by chlorine from sea sprays. Activists say this is soluble in water from rain and does not reach the stratosphere. Guess what. South Pole is a cold desert almost never receiving rainfall. Air humidity is near zero. Cannot dissolve chlorine without water in the air. The Arctic Ocean is not completely frozen. There is some evaporation and water in the air.
There might not be rain but there is certainly snow which falls around the coast this is where the Cl from the surrounding ocean is precipitated out. In any case the air over the poles is descending from the stratosphere and it got there by ascending at lower latitudes where rain certainly washes it out, the CFCs however are not washed out and generate catalytic halogen species that remove O3.
Amazing how snow and rain seek out each chlorine atom in the atmosphere and bring it down to the ground. I guess the air has no dust particle. Each particle has been eliminated by snow and rain. After all, dust is bigger than an atom. Easier to catch by snow and rain.
BTW I didn’t know the air at the poles descended from the stratosphere. I always thought the air in the stratosphere is less dense than air in the troposphere. Maybe Archimedes was wrong. Lighter fluids sink in heavier fluids.
Dr. Strangelove : “There is some evaporation and water in the air.”
Exactly and this brings down the cloride.
By the way: How would you make chlorine free radicals from chloride?
O.k. I forgot: Dr. Strangelove
Cloud static electricity enables electrolysis of chloride solution
2NaCl + 2H2O –> Cl2 + H2 + 2NaOH
UV splits Cl2 into free radicals
Cl2 –> Cl* + Cl*
ok you forgot
“Exactly and this brings down the chloride”
There should never be CO2 in the atmosphere. They are all dissolved in water and brought down by rain. Brilliant idea!
The ozone hole is an absence of the reaction of sunlight (the UV element) hitting oxygen molecules, splitting them into ions, and them rushing back together casuing O2 and O3. 🙂
Thats why the “holes” only appear at the pole that is experiencing winter! 😀
Completely wrong.
The O3 destroying reactions are photolytic which is why O3 is not destroyed during the winter, also the destructive species are sequestered on Polar Stratospheric clouds during the extreme cold. When the sun rises in the spring the PSCs melt, release the destructive species and the photolysis reactions take place under the influence of the UV light.
This is why the holes appear in the spring.
The O3 destroying reactions are photolytic
====
Where did you get that completely wrong story from?
“When ozone is produced it will decay rapidly, because ozone is an instable compound with a relatively short half-life”
http://www.lenntech.com/library/ozone/decomposition/ozone-decomposition.htm
Photolysis produces and replenishes ozone — spontaneous reactions destroy it.
btw, phil
Watch the animation provided at the end of the article, noting that ozone depletion increases throughout winter, reaching maximum depletion in early spring when the polar vortex is at maximum velocity and therefore most isolated/detached from the surrounding ozone rich regions.
Note the increasing concentration of ozone in the accretion region.
That is why the “hole”— and those mountains surrounding it that you forgot to mention—are at maximum depth/height in early Antarctic spring.
Note that your CFC fairy tale doesn’t account for the accretion region, because it can’t! (hence why proponents of the CFC depletion story fastidiously ignore accretion.) Note that the depletion/accretion phenomena comes to an end in spring when the polar vortex warms and weakens, ending the period of isolation, allowing ozone enriched rich air to flow poleward and mix with the ozone depleted air.
CFCs are redundant to the explanation of the natural phenomena. Since they can’t explain accretion, they are also deficient.
See my annotated CFC-free explanation from NASA, above.
Yes, basically the CFC-ozone hole connection was a lynch mob. They wanted to find a way – ANY WAY – to ban ANY industrial material. They needed a victim, and they needed a suspect to lynch. And they got out their pitchforks and torches and proceeded to hang an innocent suspect.
And, having gotten their blood lust up, then it was on to lynch the much more ubiquitous CO2.
“…Joe D’Aleo says he thinks that the Antarctic ozone hole might simply be a permanent feature of the Earth that we only discovered when we went looking for the posited ozone reduction”
I was far from a climate skeptic back in the 1980s when this CFCs>ozone-hole alarm popped up, but my first question was exactly what Joe asks now – “How do they know it wasn’t there before? Has anyone even checked?” They never did.
It mattered to me, because at the time I was working on big monster hot-runner plastic multi-layer co-injection blow molds and frequently got burned by the hot runner block and other heated elements (about 430°F). The VERY BEST means of treating burns, I found out, was CFC sprays – such as the ones they used during football games to freeze sprained ankles. The CFC spray was so cold and so quick that burns did not get a chance to make blisters, and the pain was taken way immediately.
So, when they decided to ban CFCs, burns in my plant were not treated as well – and were MUCH more painful. But that is why I paid attention, and to this day, even though I’ve kept my ear to the ground about it, I have not EVER heard of anyone even LOOKING to see if the ozone hole was there before the satellites indicated its presence.
You can’t have looked very hard, the original BAS data dating from 1956 showed no hole there until the early 80s.
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/facts/images/halley_toms_ozone.png
Instruments on the ground (at Halley) and high above Antarctica (the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer [TOMS] and Ozone Monitoring Instrument [OMI]) measured an acute drop in total atmospheric ozone during October in the early and middle 1980s. (Halley data supplied by J. D. Shanklin, British Antarctic Survey ).
Phil.
You say
Say what!?
Your graph does not show any “hole”. It shows a time period from ~1956 to the present during which the ozone concentration fluctuated between ~325 and ~100 DU in a manner approximating a sine curve.
At issue is whether that fluctuation is natural or not, and your assertions provide no evidence pertaining to that issue.
Richard
Khwarizmi September 15, 2014 at 7:58 pm
The O3 destroying reactions are photolytic
====
Where did you get that completely wrong story from?
That correct story is based on the fundamental physical chemistry of the process.
“When ozone is produced it will decay rapidly, because ozone is an instable compound with a relatively short half-life”
http://www.lenntech.com/library/ozone/decomposition/ozone-decomposition.htm
Great an article on the use of ozone in water! We are talking about the stratosphere in winter where the temperature is about -80ºC. Your own citation rebuts your own comment since it says the half-life of ozone in the atmosphere is 3 months at -50ºC and doubles for every further 10ºC reduction!
So your own source says that in the stratosphere in the antarctic winter O3 is not unstable and doesn’t decay rapidly.
Photolysis produces and replenishes ozone — spontaneous reactions destroy it.
In the antarctic spring in the stratosphere, photolytic reactions with halogen species destroy it.
Dr. Strangelove September 15, 2014 at 8:32 pm
Amazing how snow and rain seek out each chlorine atom in the atmosphere and bring it down to the ground. I guess the air has no dust particle. Each particle has been eliminated by snow and rain. After all, dust is bigger than an atom. Easier to catch by snow and rain.
BTW I didn’t know the air at the poles descended from the stratosphere. I always thought the air in the stratosphere is less dense than air in the troposphere. Maybe Archimedes was wrong. Lighter fluids sink in heavier fluids.
Well you learn something everyday don’t you, it’s called the Polar Cell and is responsible for the high pressure over Antarctica.
See here for example: http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/wxwise/class/gencirc.html
“Polar Cell
Sinking air at the poles warms and results in a high pressure over the poles. At the surface, the poleward moving air gets pulled to the right by the Coriolis force (in the northern hemisphere) forming the polar easterly winds. The cold polar air meets with the warm subtropical air moving poleward and forms the boundary between these two air masses known as the polar front. The warm air from the subtropics pushes up over the cold equatorward moving polar air. “
richardscourtney September 17, 2014 at 3:48 am
Phil.
You say
You can’t have looked very hard, the original BAS data dating from 1956 showed no hole there until the early 80s.
Say what!?
Your graph does not show any “hole”. It shows a time period from ~1956 to the present during which the ozone concentration fluctuated between ~325 and ~100 DU in a manner approximating a sine curve.
At issue is whether that fluctuation is natural or not, and your assertions provide no evidence pertaining to that issue.
No it was stated that there had been no attempt to see if there had been a ‘hole’ prior to the satellite data which the poster mistakenly thought was how the reduction in Ozone had been detected. I showed that there was data which showing the absence of the ‘hole’ in the late 50s through early 80’s. More like a logistic curve than a sinusoid. Since we know the mechanism of O3 destruction and components of it are not natural it is likely that the enhanced destruction is not a natural phenomena.
Contrary to the assertion attributed to D’Aleo above, no one went ‘looking for the posited ozone reduction’, the data had been taken long before there was any such suggestion.
Phil.
You continue your usual practice of bolstering opinion with unjustifiable assertion when you say
And that assertion of “not natural” is an unfounded excuse to ignore my statement that
I like evidence, information and analysis. But, as usual, you only provide assertion, assumption and unjustifiable prejudice.
Richard
No richard I provided data, something you avoided doing, but you don’t like it because it doesn’t conform to your prejudice. Then you made a completely unjustified assertion that there was a fluctuation approximating a sine curve to which I replied based on the same evidence, which I had provided, that it more like a logistic curve. There is no evidence of a periodic fluctuation which would be implied by a sinusoid. Since you like evidence I suggest you read up on the mechanism of the destruction of O3:
http://www.epa.gov/ozone/science/index.html
Phil.
You really ‘take the biscuit’.
You did NOT provide information: you provided information together with unfounded assertion and prejudice, and when I pointed that out you have accused me of prejudice! This, of course, is typical of your usual schoolyard behaviour.
Phil.,
there is no ‘hole’: that is a misnomer,
and
the supposed ‘ozone hole’ was used to enable the Montreal Protocol that banned CFCs,
and
the Montreal Protocol was used as the model for the Kyoto Protocol intended to constrain CO2 emissions,
and
there is no history of the Antarctic O3 concentration prior to 1956,
and
the relationship of CFCs to the ‘ozone hole’ was never adequately demonstrated and evidence which refutes the relationship has increased with time. One of those pieces of evidence can be found here:
http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070924/full/449382a.html
You probably know all this but – as you usually do – you prefer to promote propaganda.
Richard
richardscourtney September 17, 2014 at 7:51 am
Phil.
You really ‘take the biscuit’.
You did NOT provide information: you provided information together with unfounded assertion and prejudice,
As anyone who has read this thread can see that is a lie, as usual when you intrude into a thread the lies and ad hominem proliferate!
In Phil. September 17, 2014 at 3:08 am I posted a graph and its caption, that’s all.
and when I pointed that out you have accused me of prejudice! This, of course, is typical of your usual schoolyard behavior.
That’s all you ever post richard, your biased assertions, misquotations and ad hominem attacks, it’s very boring.
Phil.,
there is no ‘hole’: that is a misnomer,
It’s actually a good description, rather like pointing to a gap in a lower level stratus cloud and saying ‘there’s a hole in the clouds’, that there might be some light wispy cirrus high above is not particularly relevant, especially if you’re a pilot who wants to get above the clouds, you don’t care about the cirrus at 40,000′. But a pedant like you will clutch onto any straw to buttress your bogus point.
the
supposedactual ‘ozone hole’ was used to enable the Montreal Protocol that banned CFCs,and
the Montreal Protocol was used as the model for the Kyoto Protocol intended to constrain CO2 emissions,
there is no history of the Antarctic O3 concentration prior to 1956,
No there is not but the BAS data which detected the antarctic ‘ozone hole’ does precede the satellite data which the post I was rebutting was unaware of.
the relationship of CFCs to the ‘ozone hole’ was never adequately demonstrated
Not true.
and evidence which refutes the relationship has increased with time.
Again not true.
One of those pieces of evidence can be found here:
http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070924/full/449382a.html
Richard’s shorthand for: ‘the only one I’ve been able to find’.
Unfortunately, that paper, which contradicted other earlier values, has been subsequently been shown to be incorrect using better methods. Of course richard will continue to trot it out in future pretending he doesn’t know about it, as is his wont.
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090507/full/news.2009.456.html
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/324/5928/781.full?searchid=1&HITS=10&hits=10&volume=324&resourcetype=HWCIT&maxtoshow=&RESULTFORMAT=&FIRSTINDEX=0&firstpage=781
“The absorption values they obtained are much larger than those reported by Pope, and agree well with previously calculated values. Reassuringly, they point to a photolysis rate that is large enough to support established models of ozone depletion and suggest that chlorine-catalysed ozone loss works even more efficiently in the polar stratosphere than thought.”
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jp9065345
“The Cl2O2 absorption cross sections obtained for wavelengths in the range 300−420 nm are in good agreement with the Cl2O2 spectrum reported previously by Burkholder et al. (J. Phys. Chem. A 1990, 94, 687) and significantly higher than the values reported by Pope et al. (J. Phys. Chem. A 2007, 111, 4322). A possible explanation for the discrepancy in the Cl2O2 cross section values with the Pope et al. study is discussed. Representative, atmospheric photolysis rate coefficients are calculated and a range of uncertainty estimated based on the determination of σCl2O2(λ) in this work. Although improvements in our fundamental understanding of the photochemistry of Cl2O2 are still desired, this work indicates that major revisions in current atmospheric chemical mechanisms are not required to simulate observed polar ozone depletion.
You probably know all this but – as you usually do yes I do.
– you prefer to promote propaganda.
I stick with the science, propaganda is your preserve.
Phil.
As usual, you provide irrelevant rant that has little relation to reality, and you throw insults like confetti but provide nothing of worth.
My link was to a paper in Nature which completely demolishes your assertions concerning the supposed cause of the ozone variation which is misnamed a “hole”. Being unable to refute it, you say that paper is the only one I could cite; that is not true, but if it were true then, so what?
I cited clear evidence which shows you are – as usual – wrong, and you have shown no ability to refute it.
You started this with your untrue assertion that the so-called ozone ‘hole’ is known to have not existed prior to 1956. That assertion is a falsehood and your bluster fails to disguise that falsehood.
And you asserted the falsehood that the so-called ‘hole’ is known to have been caused by human emissions of CFCs. I refuted that falsehood with clear evidence that you have shown no ability to answer.
Now please return to your playpen until you have overcome your temper tantrum.
Richard
Richard, you would do well to heed Mark Twain’s advice: “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.”
My link was to a paper in Nature which completely demolishes your assertions concerning the supposed cause of the ozone variation which is misnamed a “hole”. Being unable to refute it, you say that paper is the only one I could cite; that is not true, but if it were true then, so what?
Because that paper has been shown to be wrong, by the two studies that I cited, so you have nothing.
I cited clear evidence which shows you are – as usual – wrong, and you have shown no ability to refute it.
On the contrary I refuted it by reference to two subsequent papers which specifically addressed the methods used and using better methods showed that that paper was wrong. I gave links to both papers and to Nature, the source of the paper you referenced which headlined its article: “Ozone data conflict resolved”.
I can only conclude that you just can’t be bothered to read anyone else’s posts since otherwise you wouldn’t have made such an obviously false statement.
You started this with your untrue assertion that the so-called ozone ‘hole’ is known to have not existed prior to 1956.
I made no such statement, you don’t improve your case by such blatant lying richard.
I suggest you return to your fantasy world and stop cluttering up the threads with your childish insults and lying.
Phil.
I am saddened that you refused to follow my instruction and return to your playpen until you had overcome your temper tantrum. In hope that it helps your ability to control yourself, I assure you that I am not trying to damage your reputation as being the most odious troll who infests WUWT.
There was no clear evidence that the variation in Antarctic stratospheric ozone existed prior to 1956. If you were to suck your dummy then perhaps you could stop bawling long enough for you to try to think how there could have been such evidence.
And the paper I cited shows that such evidence as did exist was inadequate. It showed that the measurements which were used as the ‘evidence’ that CFCs had caused of the reduction to Antarctic stratospheric ozone concentration were inaccurate. The papers you cited did not falsify that finding but showed the measurement error bands could be increased to enable the CFC hypothesis to be sustained.
Such post hoc excuses for inconvenient truths are now the norm for climastrology; e.g. excuses for absence of the tropospheric ‘hot spot’, ‘missing heat’ hiding in the oceans, 52 excuses for lack of ‘projected’ and ‘predicted’ warming. etc..
Now suck your dummy, cuddle your ‘blankie’, and play with your toys instead of bothering the grown-ups with your screaming.
Richard
richardscourtney September 19, 2014 at 12:49 am
Phil.
I am saddened that you refused to follow my instruction and return to your playpen until you had overcome your temper tantrum. In hope that it helps your ability to control yourself, I assure you that I am not trying to damage your reputation as being the most odious troll who infests WUWT.
Your behavior clearly shows that you have earned that title by a wide margin.
There was no clear evidence that the variation in Antarctic stratospheric ozone existed prior to 1956. If you were to suck your dummy then perhaps you could stop bawling long enough for you to try to think how there could have been such evidence.
Good so you agree with me on that point, stick to the science and stop your childish insults.
And the paper I cited shows that such evidence as did exist was inadequate. It showed that the measurements which were used as the ‘evidence’ that CFCs had caused of the reduction to Antarctic stratospheric ozone concentration were inaccurate.
Clearly you didn’t read the paper or didn’t understand it, it says nothing of the sort. Pope et al tried to measure the photolysis rate of Cl2O2, a key step in the mechanism of O3 destruction. They used a different approach than had been used before and came up with a value an order of magnitude lower than previous measurements.
The papers you cited did not falsify that finding but showed the measurement error bands could be increased to enable the CFC hypothesis to be sustained.
The first study to check Pope’s result used a molecular beam experiment which wasn’t subject to the problem of impurities that Pope’s was and showed values consistent with the previous results, there was no increase in error bands, Pope’s results are clearly an outlier by a wide margin, as Pope said: “”Impurity does pose a problem, and their method seems like a rigorous way of getting round it, If their numbers are correct, ours were wrong.” The second study by Burkholder’s group showed excellent agreement with the new data using a different method and show that the Pope data is in error. Further work by Chen’s group has confirmed this.
Contrary to your claim, the work that I cited has narrowed the error bands of the photolysis rates.
Now try to focus on the science not the other childish nonsense.
Phil.
There is no evidence of Antarctic stratospheric ozone variation prior to 1956 because there are no measurements prior to 1956.
The hypothesis of CFCs being responsible for the variation is – at best – dubious.
Your nit-picking does not change those realities, so please return to your playpen and leave the discussion to grown-ups. As usual, your presence is an unpleasant pollution of the thread.
Richard
There is no evidence of Antarctic stratospheric ozone variation prior to 1956 because there are no measurements prior to 1956.
Quite so as I pointed out previously, I’m not sure why you think that it’s important enough to keep bringing up rather than answer the substantive points I made. There’s also no evidence of such variation after 1956 until the late 70’s for which we do have measurements which makes your claim of a sinusoidal fluctuation unsupported by the data, hence my suggestion of a logistic curve which is consistent with the existing data.
The hypothesis of CFCs being responsible for the variation is – at best – dubious.
Not at all, it’s well supported by the data, inconvenient for your paymasters no doubt.
Your nit-picking does not change those realities,
The scientific data I present does however contradict your ‘reality’ which is why you throw such a hissy fit every time it’s presented. When you resort to bringing up papers which had been rebutted 5 years ago expect to have them shot down (and not just by me)
Phil.
If you really think your irrelevant and trivial ‘red herrings’ are “substantive points” then be pleased they remain unchallenged because I cannot be bothered to address them.
The level of natural background variation is not known because there is no data prior to 1956. You say you cannot understand why that is important, and knowing your ‘previous’ I am willing to believe you are so incompetent and so ignorant that – as you claim – you fail to see the importance of that when attributing the variation to humanity.
I repeat, please return to your playpen because your childish tantrums are annoying.
Richard
richardscourtney September 19, 2014 at 7:32 am
Phil.
If you really think your irrelevant and trivial ‘red herrings’ are “substantive points” then be pleased they remain unchallenged because I cannot be bothered to address them.
Which is richard-speak for, ‘I don’t understand them and I lack the competence to address them so I’ll pretend they don’t exist’. Research which proves that the only evidence you provided in an attempt to rebut the ozone depletion mechanism was in error is both relevant and substantive. It’s unfortunate that whoever fed you that information failed to warn you that it was obsolete and put you in this difficult position.
The level of natural background variation is not known because there is no data prior to 1956. You say you cannot understand why that is important,
More of your lies richard, I did not say that, I said that I couldn’t understand “why you think that it’s important enough to keep bringing up rather than answer the substantive points I made”, which is quite different. I know that you’ve demonstrated on here that your reading comprehension isn’t that good but it’s really not that difficult.
and knowing your ‘previous’ I am willing to believe you are so incompetent and so ignorant that – as you claim – you fail to see the importance of that when attributing the variation to humanity.
The lack of that data isn’t that important, your argument that because we don’t know what happened before 1956 we can never know what is causing the present depletion of stratospheric O3 in the antarctic spring is bogus. We know that something changed there in the late 70’s, we know the conditions under which it happens, we know that CFCs were accumulating there at that time, we know they were breaking down to form halogen compounds which are catalytic to the breakdown of O3, we know that they are concentrated and stored on PSC ice crystals which form in the extreme cold of the antarctic winter, and we know that these compounds are released in the spring when the first UV reaches there. Using all those facts we are able to put together a photo-kinetic reaction scheme which is able to reproduce the observed behavior very well.
I repeat, please return to your playpen because your childish tantrums are annoying.
I’m sure that you do find it annoying that the scientific facts which contradict your propaganda continue to be presented here, tough, deal with it.
Phil.
Thanks for the laugh. Your claim that your unsubstantiated opinions are “scientific facts” (whatever they are) is plain stupid. And your pretense that you understand what you are talking about has failed.
Now please return to your playpen because your gibberish is becoming increasingly annoying.
Richard
Friends
In case of the the unlikely circumstance that anybody has been following this, I explain the issue.
Ozone has fluctuated in the Antarctic stratosphere and the multi-year fluctuation was a reduction following firast measurements of Antarctic stratospheric ozone in 1956.. The true natural level of the ozone is not known but the ozone concentration fluctuates naturally. Indeed, the ozone is destroyed by sunlight which is present only in the Antarctic summer. The ozone is also destroyed by interaction with chlorine compounds such as those emitted by the Antarctic Mount Erebus volcano.
Humans emit chlorine compounds known as CFCs and, of course, they also destroy ozone. It is claimed that the reduction in the antarctic ozone since 1956 is caused by emissions of CFCs which reach the antarctic stratosphere. The degree of this effect is not known because there is no measured natural level of the ozone or its fluctuation. So, self-serving idiots like Phil. misnamed the reduction a ‘hole’ and claimed it was entirely caused by CFCs. Of course, with no known natural degree of fluctuation there is no way to determine if they are right, wrong, or partly right.
But they used their assertions as excuse for the Montreal Protocol which banned CFCs.
And obnoxious miscreants like Phil. who are making a living from these environmental scares pretend the CFCs are known to be responsible for the ozone depletion. Contemptible is too good a word for such people.
Richard
Muddy the waters with your incoherent ramblings more like.
Stratospheric ozone is created by UV light, but is destroyed by photolytic reactions with halogen compounds in the antarctic spring.
The first measurements of total column O3 from 1956 showed an annual fluctuation from about 300-400 DU without the larger peak seen in the results from the arctic (Spitzbergen). This continued for about 20 years whereupon there was a rapid drop in the spring minimum (to below 200 DU by ’85, 91 DU in ’93) coincident with a rapid rise in stratospheric CFC concentration (there has been a 4-fold increase since the 50s). Balloon sonde results showed that the drop was due to virtually total loss of O3 between 15 and 20 km, where was a peak during the winter about 2 months before, the ‘hole’.
The chlorinated compounds that are responsible for the destruction of the stratospheric O3 have been shown to be almost totally organic in origin (CFCs), Cl in the atmosphere from other sources such as volcanoes is negligible by comparison. Occasional volcanic contributions in the stratosphere occur when there are large eruptions (VEI greater than 3), Mt Erebus at it’s most active is in the range of VEI 1-2 so is a factor of hundreds too low. In fact when active its plume reaches no more than 0.5 km and mostly its emissions just drift over the walls of the cone so it is a non factor.
“obnoxious miscreants like Phil. who are making a living from these environmental scares”
More of your lies richard, have you no shame?
Refs
R. Zander, C. P. Rinsland, C. B. Farmer, and R. H. Norton, “Infrared Spectroscopic measurements of halogenated source gases in the stratosphere with the ATMOS instrument”,
J. Geophys. Res. _92_, 9836, 1987.
R. Zander, M.R. Gunson, J.C. Foster, C.P. Rinsland, and J. Namkung,
“Stratospheric ClONO2, HCl, and HF concentration profiles derived from ATMOS/Spacelab 3 observations- an update”, J. Geophys. Res. _95_, 20519, 1990.
[R. Zander, M. R. Gunson, C. B. Farmer, C. P. Rinsland, F. W. Irion, and E. Mahieu,
“The 1985 chlorine and fluorine inventories in the stratosphere based on ATMOS observations
at 30 degrees North latitude”, J. Atmos. Chem. _15_, 171, 1992.
G. Zreda-Gostynska, P. R. Kyle, and D. L. Finnegan, “Chlorine, Fluorine and Sulfur Emissions from
Mt. Erebus, Antarctica and estimated contribution to the antarctic
atmosphere”, _Geophys. Res. Lett._ _20_, 1959, 1993.