Death from above? Satellites could deplete ozone levels, research finds

[oliversmithos]

The most dangerous man in the 20th century arguably was Thomas Midgley Jr. who developed commercial CFCs.

Freon nearly destroyed the ozone layer. It was lucky it was detected in time. Another 30 or 40 years of using it could have killed most life on Earth. Radiation scorching plant life, crops, then widespread starvation for animals. If we didn't have the technology and people to discover the problem in the 1970s by this decade it would have been obliterated.

It was so serious that everybody signed and ratified The Montreal Protocol. Even the likes of North Korea.

Oh and he also made millions and millions of people several IQ points dumber by poisoning the atmosphere with lead. He invented leaded gasoline and pushed it commercially even when he knew full well it was dangerous and highly persistent, still easily detectible today.

Great.

I should marry soon then Ig

 

[Vulcanproject]

Global increase of ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons from 2010 to 2020 - Nature Geoscience

Levels of five chlorofluorocarbons rose in the atmosphere from 2010 to 2020 despite their production being banned by the Montreal Protocol, probably arising as by-products of hydrofluorocarbon production, according to analysis of abundance and emissions data.

www.nature.com

So essentially we've seen a continual increase in stratospheric CFCs from 1940 up to the present era. Yet where's the resultant catastrophe?

Yes, there has been increases because historic CFC emissions take decades to reach the stratosphere. CFCs are unbelievably persistent. They hang around in the lower atmosphere. They have continued to do so even after the Montreal Protocol took effect. Some production of some CFCs continued.

Your linked to study accounts for only five highly controlled and allowed (under the Montreal Protocol) feedstock CFCs in the production of other compounds, like HFCs. This is not the same concept as the masses of CFC emissions at say late 1970 levels because of their ubiquity in consumer products.

Those simulated projections were based on essentially unregulated use of CFCs at the levels before the Montreal Protocol, meaning massive cumulative effects spanning decades. This has never been in doubt in the scientific community. It's not up for debate. You'll find recent peer reviewed studies on potential UVB related losses of vegetation acting as the carbon sink that acknowledge the potentially catastrophic effects based on these well regarded simulations.

You're using all the same techniques as climate change deniers to pretend there is no prevailing trend. I have seen it all before. You pulled quotes from the same article by Ben Lieberman: lawyer, lobbyist and distinctly unscientific climate change denier.

Like I said if you had something really important, tell it to the scientists running these projections and not to me. No more attempts at point scoring in a meaningless forum using quotes from lawyers to back up your climate claims. Enough.

 

[Endymio]

Yes, there has been increases because historic CFC emissions take decades to reach the stratosphere.

Yet those increases failed to generate increased ozone depletion. The historical data shows no positive correlation between the two, with random variation from meteorologic processes and solar storms repeatedly causing massive increases and declines. And even when we see a large decline, that fails to translate to increased UVB levels at the earth's surface.

BTW -- still waiting on you to back up that claim of a "scientific consensus" that CFCs were going to end life on earth.

Your linked to study accounts for only five highly controlled and allowed (under the Montreal Protocol) feedstock CFCs in the production of other compounds, like HFCs.

CFCs all contain chlorine, which becomes atomic chlorine in the upper stratosphere. CFCs don't destroy ozone (so the theory goes) but the chlorine does. And the purpose of the study was to demonstrate the continued increase in stratospheric chlorine.

Those simulated projections were based on essentially unregulated use of CFCs

Which part of the word "simulated" did you fail to understand? These computer models are all based on the same assumption -- that atomic chlorine is the primary driver for O3 destruction.

BTW -- still waiting on you to back up that claim of a "scientific consensus" that CFCs were going to end life on earth.

 

[Vulcanproject]

BTW -- still waiting on you to back up that claim of a "scientific consensus" that CFCs were going to end life on earth.

There was and still is broad scientific consensus that continued widespread use of CFCs depleted the ozone layer and it would be catastrophic for life on earth as we know it. In ways we understand and many others we probably don't. The debate was closed on those negative outcomes forty years ago.

When you're quoting lawyer Ben Lieberman as your source then I don't feel obligated to pull out the endless peer reviewed studies by actual scientists and go through them forensically with you on the Techspot forum. There has gotta be other crank forums you can do that on surely.

 

[Endymio]

There was and still is broad scientific consensus that continued widespread use of CFCs depleted the ozone layer and it would be catastrophic for life on earth as we know it.

False. Post a link or withdraw the claim that CFC usage would "end most life on earth".

.The debate was closed on those negative outcomes forty years ago.

Anyone who claims that scientific debate is ever closed on ANY issue doesn't understand even the rudiments of science.

 

[bandit8623]

Sure -- if the ozone layer vanished entirely. I already said that. But move from Stockholm to Miami and you'll see the same 500% increase in UV. Move from already-high Miami to the upper Altiplano of the Andes, and you'll see another 500% increase.

Or stay in the city you're already in, but spend more time outdoors instead. Most people get about an hour a day's solar exposure ... but workers with outdoor professions regularly get 9 or 10 times that. That's a 1,000% increase. Even those people who farm 10+ hours outdoors in a high-UV region like the Altiplano (and thus get 10,000% the UV dose as your average New Yorker) aren't keeling over from radiation burns and malignant skin cancers.

The sky isn't falling, Chicken Little.

It's the same with all the science that said your covid vaccine protects you against spreading the virus.. how many times did that science change? People take a few lab tests and believe that's it's fact. When almost all of it was to scare people whether they meant to or not. In the end the facts are different than what the consensus was.

In the end it was about making money.
Changing cooling chemicals was a huge money Maker. Same for covid huge money Maker.
Follow the money.