Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 7, 1992 TAG: 9202070391
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
NEW URGENCY ON OZONE
TO MOST PEOPLE, environmental damage is epitomized by massive oil spills, choking smog or hazardous-waste dumps. It's easy to get angry about such events and, often, to find handy villains like big business.But such events are localized and can be contained; in most cases, the environment can recover fairly soon. And we overlook the fact that polluting industries are, in effect, our agents: They produce or convey goods, such as petroleum and chemicals, that we demand to sustain our lifestyle.
Much worse is the gradual and subtle effect of millions of small, sometimes invisible events that cause cumulative environmental damage. One is the steady rise in burning of fossil fuels that contributes to global warming. (Our cars are the biggest source of air pollution.) Another is the spreading use of manmade chemicals in refrigerants, cleaning solvents and thermal insulators that lead to erosion of the Earth's ozone layer.
Scientists still may differ on how imminent a threat is the greenhouse effect which is accelerated by fossil-fuel burning. But there's consensus not only that the ozone layer is besieged, but also that it's deteriorating faster than had been thought. High-altitude observations over New England and eastern Canada less than a month ago found the highest levels of ozone-destroying chlorine ever measured anywhere over the planet: 1.5 parts per billion.
That's about half again as high as the biggest level found over Antarctica. Ozone holes, it appears, will no longer be confined to the sky above icy wilderness, but will open over hundreds of millions of humans - perhaps even before this winter's over. Weather permitting, ozone over parts of the Northern Hemisphere could be depleted by 30 to 40 percent, compared with 50 percent loss over Antarctica.
The ozone layer is nature's shield. Life as we know it on this planet could not have evolved without it. Its erosion allows more ultraviolet rays from the sun to get through. These can increase skin cancers and cataracts; destroy proteins; distort the genetic messages in DNA; kill microscopic organisms that sustain the marine life chain. All of the long-term effects cannot be calculated, but all of them are scary.
It was first observed in the mid-1970s that the industrial chemicals chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, rise to the upper atmosphere and react there with air to destroy ozone. Measurements since then have shown ozone loss becoming steadily worse; lately it has increased at a pace unforeseen only a few years ago.
Like damage to smaller ecosystems, this can be halted and reversed; unfortunately, with the ozone layer it would take decades. An international treaty went into effect two years ago, calling for halving production of CFCs by the year 2000. In response to fresher data, the signatories changed the goal to a total halt. (Substitutes for CFCs are available.)
A meeting is scheduled for later this year to consider moving that up to 1996, and the latest findings add to the urgency. The United States, a latecomer to the cause of salvaging the ozone layer, should now take the lead - not least because it seems that our own populace and ecology may soon be endangered. The longer the world waits, the worse the effects will be and the longer recovery will take.