Will next few decades be enough to recover Earth’s Ozone Layers

Some positive news at last? According to a United Nations-backed group of experts, the Earth’s protective ozone layer is expected to rebound within four decades and close an ozone hole that was first spotted in the 1980s. The paper states that, with the exception of the polar areas, the depletion of the ozone layer, which ran the risk of exposing people to dangerous ultraviolet rays from the sun, is on course to be fully recovered by 2040. The ozone layer will entirely recover over the Arctic by 2045 and over the Antarctic by 2066. The poles will take a little longer.

Since the 1989 Montreal Protocol, an international agreement that helped eradicate 99% of ozone-depleting chemicals like chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) that were used as solvents and refrigerants, the ozone layer has been steadily improving following alarm over the loss of ozone in the 1980s. As greenhouse gases, CFCs could have increased global temperatures by up to 1C by the middle of the century, worsening an already dire situation where planet-heating gases are still not declining, according to the UN, the action taken to protect the ozone layer had also bolstered the more ponderous response to the climate crisis.The panel’s findings were presented at the American Meteorological Society’s 103rd annual meeting on Monday. The panel was made up of a sizable international group of experts, including representatives from the World Meteorological Organization, United Nations Environment Programme, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration, among others.