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Science News

Ozone Hole Splits in Two 56

Posted by timothy from the not-like-the-andromeda-strain dept.
DaDigz writes "CNN is reporting here that the hole in the ozone layer above Antarctica has split in two "like a giant amoeba". It's not yet been determined whether this is a result of unusual weather patterns or whether the ozone layer is recovering. One can hope, though, that this may be a sign of a mend in the ozone layer."
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Ozone Hole Splits in Two More

Ozone Hole Splits in Two

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  • I'm just curious.. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hitzroth ( 60178 ) on Monday September 30, 2002 @11:17PM (#4364859)
    do we know for sure that there was a time when there wasn't a hole in the ozone layer over Antarctica?
    • Never mind. That's what I get for not reading the article.

    • Re:I'm just curious.. (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Hadlock ( 143607 )
      i haven't read the article yet, and probably won't, but oh well. yeah. they've been absorbing more data than they can examine from 2-3 sattelities over the past 35-ish years, and the ozone hole actually closes durring either the winter or summer months, and then reopens again as it weakens again. so yes, it does close, and they have good reason to be suspicious. a better question might be "does the "soft spot" of the earth open up from time to time on a somewhat regular schedule over a period of centuries, or did we really fuck things up?"

      my guess is a litte from column a, a little from column b. (although more from A than B)
    • Yes, ice core samples reveal that prior to 1960, there was no hole in the ozone layer. The effects of UV on the ice layers is quite easy to detect in ice cores.

  • Monkey wrench in hopes for mend (Score:3, Insightful)

    by captainktainer ( 588167 ) <captainktainerNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Monday September 30, 2002 @11:20PM (#4364877)
    Unfortunately, CFCs are not fully phased out all over the world. China still uses them, and since China's set to become the world economic powerhouse over the next half-century, the only hope for continued recovery is getting them to halt their production of CFCs. And quite honestly, does anybody really believe that chlorofluorocarbons aren't used in places like India? I mean, there's a reason they were so popular- cheap, relatively easy to manufacture, effective; they would be a wonder chemical if they didn't eat holes in the ozone layer. In less ecologically sensitive countries (yes, one can be less ecologically sensitive than the United States) with weak environmental controls, use of CFCs is a rather attractive proposition.

    • Exactly.

      Much as it's fashionable to rail against the US for not being as environmentally responsible than it could be (or maybe even should be), the fact remains that various third world (to use an obsolete term) nations are far more egregious offenders than the US (see leaded gasoline, CFCs, etc.).

      • various third world (to use an obsolete term) nations are far more egregious offenders than the US

        In what terms? Absolute? Per captia?

        Third world countries economies are generally tiny. Even if each car is more poluting than the average american SUV, it doesn't matter much cause they don't have many cars.

        Really america should be comparing itself with the developed world though. Saying 'we are better than bangladesh' doesn't have much impact with me.

  • It's Just Evolving (Score:4, Funny)

    by sameb ( 532621 ) on Monday September 30, 2002 @11:25PM (#4364903) Homepage
    >It's split in two like an amoeba.

    This quite obviously means that the ozone layer is a living organism, and in a hundred million years, we'll have intelligent creatures that are entirely made up of ozone layer.

  • Biology . . . (Score:2, Funny)

    by Dausha ( 546002 )
    If the ozone hole is splitting, then perhaps it is alive. Or, perhaps it was just lonely and tired of everybody trying to find ways to get rid of it. I know I'd have a big inferiority complex if everybody talked about me so negatively.
  • Seriously, has the human population been reducing the amount of ozone-depleting activities? I didn't anticipate hearing this kind of news in my lifetime.

    I realize this is coming off as extremely sarcastic, but I thought we were still pumping out the carbon monoxide at apocalyptic rates.
    • Seriously, has the human population been reducing the amount of ozone-depleting activities... I thought we were still pumping out the carbon monoxide at apocalyptic rates.


      You're mixing up different problems and different chemicals.

      We have reduced chloroflorocarbon - CFC - production pretty well. CFCs are what attack the ozone layer.

      Carbon dioxide - CO2 - emmissions continue to be high. You get it every time you burn something or breathe out; but the problem is that burning fossil fuels adds more C02 to the air than the normal biological cycle. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, but not toxic.

      Carbon monoxide - CO - is a toxic gas. This is what kills you if you leave your car running in a closed garage; it is often used for killing animals. It results from ineffecient combustion. Catalytic converters and oxygenated fuels have reduced CO emissions over the past few years.

      Summary:

      • CFCs - ozone killer. Emissions down, but potential that newly industrialized nations may start pumping the stuff out again.

      • Carbon dioxide - greenhouse gas. (One of several.) Emissions up. To reduce CO2 emissions we have to stop burning fossil fuels.

      • Carbon monoxide - toxic. Mostly comes out of our vehicle's tailpipes. Emissions down but still a significant health problem in large cities.
      • "Carbon dioxide - greenhouse gas. (One of several.) Emissions up. To reduce CO2 emissions we have to stop burning fossil fuels."

        I agree in principle, but I'd like to bring up a couple of points:
        If we are talking about gross CO2 emissions, to reduce CO2 emissions we have to REDUCE (not stop) burning fossil fuels.
        If we are talking about net CO2 emissions, reducing/ nearly stopping the burning of fossil fuels would certainly reduce net CO2 emissions.

        However, engineering solutions should not be wholly discounted. For example, I seem to remember some plan for reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by storing it in the oceans. I don't think this is practical (or probably desirable), but the same effect could be obtained by growing fast-growing weeds and burying them in abandoned mining shafts, etc. Or, simply increasing the total mass of plant-life by creating more acres of forests.
        However, interest in organic farming has increased greatly recently, and organic farming uses much more land per pound of food grown than conventional high-yield farming. Organic farming's need for increased farming acreage may prevent more land from being devoted to forests.

        The secondary (and tertiary, etc.) effects of plans such as the Kyoto Protocol are myriad and difficult to predict (or even attribute after the fact). It's a shame that these complex and far-reaching issues are so often reduced to soundbites and headlines.
        • However, engineering solutions should not be wholly discounted.

          As a temporary stopgap as we move to sustainable energy, perhaps they may be of use. They're certainly interesting to think about.

          However, until we have a much deeper understanding of ecology I'd have to say it's much wiser to give priority to stopping our f*cking around with the spaceship's life support system and letting it reset itself, than to f*cking with it some more in hopes of balancing out our first f*ckups.

          However, interest in organic farming has increased greatly recently, and organic farming uses much more land per pound of food grown than conventional high-yield farming.

          The difference is not that great, perhaps on the order of 10 percent. (Some say [coopfoodstore.com] that there's no significant difference at all. There are others who claim that organic methods have very low yields, but I think agriculture research sponsored by Dow and Monsanto has about the same credibility as lung cancer research sponsored by Phillip Morris.) Considering that most organic farmers are new to the methods involved, we can expect yields to rise as experience is gained.

          Also, if you want to talk land use you need to factor in the land used for energy production, the land taken up by chemical plants, the land used up by drilling and mining operations, the land used for waste disposal of all of these operations, and the land eventually rendered unsuitable for agriculture by non-sustainable methods.

          That's not even factoring in water pollution from fertilizer and pesticide production and runoff, air pollution from chemical production and energy production. And not even touching on the health costs of pesticide contamination in the finished food product.

          Considering the total resource footprint, organic is the clear winner.

          And there's little "conventional" about chemical-saturated high-yield farming - it represents a very small slice of humanity's experience with agriculture.

          The secondary (and tertiary, etc.) effects of plans such as the Kyoto Protocol are myriad and difficult to predict (or even attribute after the fact).

          Certainly no more so than the effects of continuing to mess around with the environment as we are.

        • However, engineering solutions should not be wholly discounted. For example, I seem to remember some plan for reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by storing it in the oceans. I don't think this is practical (or probably desirable), but the same effect could be obtained by growing fast-growing weeds and burying them in abandoned mining shafts, etc.
          The problems with storing the CO2 in the oceans are pretty major. First of all, the way to do it was by stimulating the growth of microscopic organisims in the sea. They would then die and sink to the bottom, along with the C02 in their cells. The first problem is obvious, it would drastically change the ocean's ecosystem. The results are not known and so it would not be a good idea to mess with. The other problem is that this idea is just increasing the throughput of the existing CO2 cycle in the ocean. It is a slow cycle, but after about 100 years we will be at the point where all that extra CO2 we sunk into the ocean today starts getting released again. So, it obviously doesn't solve any problems, just delays them.

          I think that the idea of fast growing weeds also wouldn't work well since we would need unimaginable amounts of the stuff to put a dent in the CO2 levels.
          Or, simply increasing the total mass of plant-life by creating more acres of forests.
          A better idea: Stop cutting down all the fscking rain forests in the first place!!! The rain forests have such densely packed vegetation, like the fast growing weeds, we would need to plant totally unrealistic acreage's of new forest too match the the CO2 absorption of the rain forests we are chopping down.
  • Everybody know that any ozone hole data means nothing. Including the data that termed it a hole in the first place.

    • Everybody knows == A failure of imagination (Score:5, Informative)

      by geoswan ( 316494 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @11:05AM (#4367203) Journal
      Everybody knows that any ozone hole data means nothing. Including the data that termed it a hole in the first place.

      I believe my math geek friends would characterize this as, "proof by assertion" ?

      You aren't making this assertion from knowledge. Your assertion is coming from your intuition. Everybody doesn't know this. I don't know this. Neither do a lot of climate experts. Neither do you. You don't have knowledge. You have a belief about the ozone hole -- based on your intuition.

      Well intuition failed us when it came to the ozone hole.

      Here are some RISKS articles, from 1986, shortly after the ozone hole was first recognized, to back me up.
      Ozone hole undetected for years due to programming error [ncl.ac.uk]
      Ozone references [ncl.ac.uk].

      Recently, it was disclosed that a large hole in the ozone layer appears once a year over the South Pole. The researchers had first detected this hole approximately 8 years ago by tests done at the South Pole itself.

      Why did they wait 8 years to disclose this disturbing fact? Because the satellite that normally gives ozone levels had not reported any such hole and the researchers could not believe that the satellite's figures could be incorrect. It took 8 years of testing before they felt confident enough to dispute the satellite's figures.

      And why did the satellite fail to report this hole? Because it had been programmed to reject values that fell outside the "normal" range!

      What happened here is that intuition failed. Intuition failed the physicists who specified the sanity filters. And, I would argue, that intuition failed you too.

      • I see your point, but I find it ironic that the author of your first link also makes a "proof by assertion" by not providing details and citing sources.
        While it is true that everyone certainly does NOT know that "any ozone hole data means nothing. Including the data that termed it a hole in the first place", it should be noted that there is some ozone in the ozone hole. Whether or not you see a hole depends upon what concentration you count as the transition between there being a hole and there not being a hole.
        Also, your links provide some support to the previous poster's assertion that ozone hole data is meaningless. Your links claim 8 years of fundamentally flawed data. Obviously, there is other, more sound evidence, but your case would be much stronger if you cited different evidence.
        You make a valid point. Arguments of this importance should be based upon the merits of the arguments and not demagoguery. But that takes much more work, and tends to be less fun.

        • You make a valid point. Arguments of this importance should be based upon the merits of the arguments and not demagoguery. But that takes much more work, and tends to be less fun.

          It does take a lot more work. I imagine sosedada spent less than 30 seconds on his proof by assertion. Hunting down those links, and writing my article, took me half an hour. But it is a worthwhile cause.

          Also, your links provide some support to the previous poster's assertion that ozone hole data is meaningless. Your links claim 8 years of fundamentally flawed data. Obviously, there is other, more sound evidence, but your case would be much stronger if you cited different evidence.

          After half an hour I decided showing that there was no certainty was enough.

          Dialogue is, I believe, the important thing. Dubya is the person I would most like to see have his views on Kyoto challenged. Dubya too, is asserting certainty, based not on knowledge, but on short term expediency and wishful thinking.

  • Due to earth's rotation, the winds get influenced and the ozone layer has split into two. The two new holes will continue drifting north.

    Is this a plausible scenario?

    • Re:A Silly Conjecture. (Score:3, Informative)

      by Yokaze ( 70883 )
      Yes, if they were located in the northern hemisphere :)

      The reason, why there is are Ozone "Holes", and not just a uniformly reduced ozone layer is that the ODS are carried by the global winds to the poles.

      All hail to the Coriolis effect.

  • Let's Simulate It ! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Raiford ( 599622 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @01:50AM (#4365396) Journal
    This should be great news for the computer simulation guys with their ozone hole models. At least fun for a year or so. "What do you mean two holes ! None of our turbulence models predict that"... Several thousand academic journal papers later, many scientific conference presentations and enough new research money to fill up both ozone layer holes we find ... "it was an amoeba"

  • the 80s strike back (Score:3, Interesting)

    by chenzhen ( 532755 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @02:05AM (#4365446) Homepage
    An interesting factor that is often ignored is the time it takes CFCs to ascend to the upper atmosphere. Most of those produced during the world's peak output have not even made it to the point where they would do any damage yet. To generalize, it may be healing now, but in the next ten years the sum total of the industrial 1980's may rip the scab right off.
    P
  • I remember reading one of the articles saying that the ozone hole was defined as an area where the density of ozone drops below a certain level.

    So isn't it possible that two holes would spread the thinning area out? The total lack of ozone still exists and could still be growing.

    • Re:Smaller holes or more distributed? (Score:4, Informative)

      by helix400 ( 558178 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @12:41PM (#4367810) Journal
      I remember reading one of the articles saying that the ozone hole was defined as an area where the density of ozone drops below a certain level.

      Yep. Quoting the article on Yahoo:
      "The ozone hole is the area with total column ozone below 220 Dobson Units...A reading of 100 Dobson Units means that if all the ozone in the air above a point were brought down to sea-level pressure and cooled to freezing it would form a layer 1 centimeter thick. At that scale a reading of 250 Dobson Units translates to a layer about an inch thick."

      So isn't it possible that two holes would spread the thinning area out? The total lack of ozone still exists and could still be growing.

      Sort of...ozone in the southern hemisphere has a funny way of displacing itself. The ozone hole is comes and goes in a cycle. First its there, half a year later it vanishes, half a year later its back...etc. The funny part is, when the hole arrives, a lot of the ozone is *displaced* around the hole. So if the south pole had only 150 Dobson units of ozone, Australia could jump up to 400 units. (275 being the rough average).

      So with today's smaller ozone holes, the missing ozone isn't necessarilly thinning the surrounding area out, its bringing all the ozone in the atmosphere back to a uniform density.

  • had to happen (Score:2, Interesting)

    by infonography ( 566403 )
    it's a simple example of The Coriolis Force

    The hole is in a cloud layer, it's not a object. Winds and gravity will mix the ozone back into the hole, making the overall layer thinner but still there.

    http://www.windpower.dk/tour/wres/coriolis.htm

    I wonder if the hole is something that is recurring rather then just an effect of pollution. maybe gravity thickens the layer around the equator leaving open patches at the poles. But it's safer to not be so messy with the planet.
    • I wonder if the hole is something that is recurring rather then just an effect of pollution ...

      The ozone hole is definitely a recurring phenomena. Ozone is a VERY reactive chemical, and is being destroyed by reactions all over the world all the time (wreaks havoc on rubber seals). It is also being produce all the time by the effect of UV rays in the upper atmosphere. (That's one reason why ozone shields from UV rays). There is a natural balance between these effects ... except where the sun doesn't shine. At the poles during the 6 month winters, the ozone is not being produced by sunlight, so it naturally has a net depletion. At the north pole, ozone can be replaced by ozone rich air from arctic winds, but at the south pole, the extreme teperature differential at the continent boundary (obviously not present at the north pole) produces strong wind paterns which isolate much of the antarctic region during the winter. As soon as the sun starts shining again... more ozone! :)

      It's too bad that it's so hard to find realistic information about what goes on.

      BTW, CFC's are extremely stable (unreactive) compounds (and extremely heavy molecules). What's more, CFC's by themselves don't destroy ozone. The theory goes something like this: Even though CFC's are quite dense, they are carried high into the upper atmosphere, where the intense radiation breaks them down to release atomic chlorine. (I'm not aware of this theoretical breakdown ever being reproduced in a lab, even though it would be a simple feat if the theory is valid). It's the atomic chlorine that repeatedly reacts with the ozone to produce diatomic oxygen and oxygen compounds. I'm still not sure why the vast natural sources of atmospheric chlorine (far in excess of CFCs) aren't a greater concern. They should make it into the upper atmosphere far easier than the high density CFC. If anyone reading has insight into this, please let me know. I can always use more info! :)


  • Pretty soon we'll start calling it the ozone hole layer instead of the ozone layer.

  • To be pedantic: (Score:4, Informative)

    by Observer ( 91365 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @05:13AM (#4365799)
    <>slashdot>It's not yet been determined whether this is a result of unusual weather patterns or whether the ozone layer is recovering.</slashdot>
    Actually, the CNN article quotes Long at MOAA as saying that the change is the result of unusual weather patterns but that it is too soon to say whether the ozone layer is recovering. Slight difference in meaning there.
  • It's obvious to me that lighter elements are fusing into heavy elements at the south pole. The evidence is that what was obviously an S orbital is now a P orbital. Just look at the picture.

  • Waves and the Polar Vortex (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jellisky ( 211018 ) on Tuesday October 01, 2002 @04:28PM (#4369518) Journal
    'Twas a very interesting evolution of the "hole", I must admit. Looks like a good fluid dynamics experiment gone unstable to me.

    A quick summary of why the ozone hole exists:

    - During polar winters, the solar insolation (amount of light from the sun) goes to zero. Since the photochemical reaction by ozone on UV light is no longer there, the stratosphere begins to cool around the poles. This leads to no ozone being produced or destroyed. (Ozone, in the stratosphere, requires light to be created in the first place.)

    - This cooling leads to the formation of a very strong vortex by an atmospheric "law" called thermal wind. This vortex tends to be incredibly strong, usually on the order of 50 m/s (112 mph). This vortex usually covers the entire polar region.

    - Given the strength of this vortex, very little mixing occurs between contents inside the vortex and outside the vortex. So, as time progresses, the already present chlorine and flourine compounds in the vortex have time to react with the ozone and deplete it noticably (since the vortex doesn't allow the ozone from the lit-up areas of the globe to mix in and refresh the levels).

    - As the sun comes back up in polar spring, the photochemical reactions begin again, further reducing the levels of ozone. However, these reactions warm up the middle of the vortex. This warming tends to break down the vortex quite quickly and allows the ozone from the middle latitudes mix in and refresh the ozone levels.

    Now, all this happens in both hemispheres during the appropriate winter months. But the Antarctic hole tends to be stronger than the Arctic one for one very simple reason: land. Topography helps set up large-scale waves in the atmosphere's flow. These waves can influence the polar vortex by essentially perturbing it. These perturbations can then grow (depending on the properties of the vortex) and become unstable, leading to a total vortex breakdown. Those events are commonly seen in the Arctic vortex since there are three large mountain ranges in the Northern Hemisphere to excite planetary-scale waves. But around Antarctica, there aren't any significant mountain ranges to excite these waves, so the vortex tends not to be perturbed significantly.

    But, it appears this season, that something is causing a very strong wavenumber-2 perturbation (wavenumber-n perturbations have n crests and troughs around a latitude circle). That's pretty obvious from the elliptical early evolution and, then, the eventual breakdown into two lobes. What actually "caused" this amplification is an excellent question. Perhaps this year's vortex was inherrently unstable to wavenumber-2 perturbations? Perhaps this season's El Nino had some odd effect on it? (Doubt that, but it's an interesting idea.) Either way, this event will be studied quite heavily the next few years, I'm sure. (Perhaps even by myself at some point.)

    -Jellisky
  • To think those environmental nuts thought the ozone hole was a problem! Now that we have it divided well have it beat it no time!! It's great how that one big problem just because 2 slightly smaller ones, well I guess now that the ozone holes have become disorganized and should be falling apart and fighting among themselves it's safe to go out tanning again, I wonder what that strange rash on my arm is...
  • Maybe the gravity of the earth's new moon(s) .. (there might be 3 now) had something to do with this?

    Then again, maybe the ozone creatures thought it would be funny to play games with the silly little humans below??? :)

  • The very first time we looked at the ozone layer, we found a hole. I have yet to see conclusive proof that it has not always been there.

    SW

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