Many people do not know that ozone depletion is considered a cause of global warming as well and it is very significant. The Ozone-Oxygen cycle absorbs UV radiation UVB and UVC. Because the Ozone layer is depleted, this heat is getting through because Ozone is formed by default where UV can get through to oxygen. The reason this causes warming is that when UV hits oxygen or ozone at any altitude, the UV is converted to heat energy. (Madronich). If the reaction happens lower down then because it did not happen higher up, it comes with a heat conversion and heat product.

For every 1% of ozone depletion the calculation has been made that a 2% increase in temperature is happening. It is estimated that the ozone column on average is now 6% depleted in 2018, so that would translate into a 12% temperature rise, which would roughly translate into an average of 1.68 degrees in a world where average warming has already increased the temperature by 1.5 ‘C and is approaching 2’C. Almost all of the warming is accounted for in this simplified way, but the temperature anomaly is not even in distribution because the poles have greater ozone depletion than the tropics, yet we still see a close correlation.

With this kind of an ozone layer depletion baseline, and the addition of the heat being added from elevated methane levels, elevated CO2 we need to be thinking about what can we reverse. So far, with an oxygen airlift to the ozone layer we could reverse the ozone depletion and with enough oxygen, we could destroy significant amounts of methane and significant amounts of  all our synthetic greenhouse gases. Next week (August 25, 2018) we will have the logistics presentation for the oxygen airlift posted, contributed by engineer and contractor, Donald Hugh D’Arcy Evans, from Rushden, UK.