In a first-ever study using ozone data collected by commercial aircraft, researchers from the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado Boulder found that levels of the pollutant in the lowest part of Earth’s atmosphere have increased across the Northern Hemisphere over the past 20 years. That’s even as tighter controls on emissions of ozone precursors have lowered ground-level ozone in some places, including North America and Europe…
In an open-access study published August21 in the journal Science Advances, the team found an overall increase in ozone levels above the Northern Hemisphere.
Abstract
Tropospheric ozone is an important greenhouse gas, is detrimental to human health and crop and ecosystem productivity, and controls the oxidizing capacity of the troposphere. Because of its high spatial and temporal variability and limited observations, quantifying net tropospheric ozone changes across the Northern Hemisphere on time scales of two decades had not been possible. Here, we show, using newly available observations from an extensive commercial aircraft monitoring network, that tropospheric ozone has increased above 11 regions of the Northern Hemisphere since the mid-1990s, consistent with the OMI/MLS satellite product. The net result of shifting anthropogenic ozone precursor emissions has led to an increase of ozone and its radiative forcing above all 11 study regions of the Northern Hemisphere, despite NOx emission reductions at midlatitudes.
“That’s a big deal because it means that as we try to limit our pollution locally, it might not work as well as we thought,” said Audrey Gaudel, a CIRES scientist working in the NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory and the study’s lead author…
In the so-called “lower troposphere,” which is closest to Earth’s surface, ozone has decreased above some mid-latitude regions, including Europe and the United States, where ozone precursor emissions have decreased.
The researchers found those reductions were offset by increases higher in the troposphere — with the net result being an overall ozone increase from the surface to 12 km… The model showed that increased emissions in the tropics were likely driving the observed increase of ozone in the Northern Hemisphere.
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Just more scaremongering.
What about biological plausibility? This is required before a large population epidemiological study can prove causality. A double blind clinical study like the human tests performed by the Obama EPA do determine biological plausibility and they determined that there was no correlation between air pollution, including ozone and Asthma or other adverse health outcomes.
According to Spaceweather.com GCM radiation is at its highest level since the start of the space age. Could ionisation caused by GCM radiation be the cause of increased ozone levels high in the earth’s atmosphere?
Any media edict including the word “than we thought” means a power grab.
Pretending to be curious when they have not one atom of genuine curiosity, only insatiable hunger for power.
Please show us data collected 20 years ago by the same methodology, so an actual real comparison can be made.
Oh wait.. this is the “first ever”
So they have nothing to actually compare it to.
“…’That’s a big deal because it means that as we try to limit our pollution locally, it might not work as well as we thought,’ said Audrey Gaudel, a CIRES scientist working in the NOAA Chemical Sciences Laboratory and the study’s lead author…”
Ummm…who is this “we” who “thought” something so inane?
Ozone is pollution now?
1) Yes, Ozone is bad for us, it’s also bad for bacteria so it’s used for disinfecting.
2) Some electric motors produce Ozone with brushes sparking. Are they going to ban motors using brushes and promote brushless motors?
3) I thought they wanted to increase the thickness of the ozone layer. We just have to wait for these to be hit with UV rays or float upto the ozone layer to return the O2.
4) So where does the Ozone molecules close to the ground come from?
Have you worked in a computer manufacturing clean room? It is flooded with ozone. You can smell it.
The best yet..
5) Lightning produces Ozone, are we going to ban thunderstorms?
I would also look for a correlation between ozone and concentration of wind turbines. Having widely distributed generators operating in the atmosphere undoubtedly contributes to ozone production.
If we were to go “all electric” in terms of cars, home heating and cooking, and mass transit, the contribution of corona discharge from transmission lines would likely contribute a significant amount of ozone in the lower troposphere.
According to EPA’s data, ozone pollution has been slashed 35% since 1980:
https://www.epa.gov/air-trends/air-quality-national-summary
Facts don’t care about Leftists’ crazy fake “SCIENCE!!! (TM)” propaganda….
The abstract states:
“Here, we show, using newly available observations from an extensive commercial aircraft monitoring network, that tropospheric ozone has increased above 11 regions of the Northern Hemisphere since the mid-1990s, consistent with the OMI/MLS satellite product.”
If this data is unique, to what past data are they comparing it?
This data could be called a new baseline. Comparing this new data to previous data which was collected using different methods sound to me like comparing apples and oranges.
With a little more ozone, maybe we’d have a little less COVID.
ozone is o3 an UNstable molecule of oxygen that forms when oxygen is heated, it doesnt last long because it is UNstable and breaks up all on its own…..calling ozone “pollution” is utter insanity.
I am surprised that members of the alarmist crowd did not use this info to suggest we are having more violent weather, thus more lightning produced ozone, when it strikes O2 molecules. Sometimes there is that feint, pleasant smell after a storm.