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Detroit News MONDAY. .4PRI1._ 27. 1992 ;iiinrnerit • The ozone scare: Policy by press release By S. Fred Singer A recentannouncementby It required careful reading to discover that NASA, the U.S. space agency, that an aircraft-borne instrument had de- tected a high reading of chlorine nothing at all was happening to ozone, ;tampeded the i?.S. Senate into pasa. ing an amendment. 96-0. calling for .m accelerated phase-uut of the man ufacture of chlorofluorocarbons. A before and after that date. The docu- used in refrigeration, air-condition- week later, the White House ordered ment was silent on this important ing, and in the manufacture of foam a phase-out of CFCs by 1995, five point. Nor did it reveal that similar plastics andelectronic circuit boards. _vearsaheadofschedules measurements in 19&9,thedateof --Butaccordingtotheeewndpresere- Allthiswasaccomplishedbytwo the last such experiment, also en- leaae,iseuetkbythesemeNASAof- CQASApressreleasesandalotofat- countered high chlorine values. Al- fice on the same day, the volcano cention from the news media. It is though widely anticipated and dis- Pinatubo was emitting chlorine com- discouraging to see public policy cussed at the time, there was no pounds and particles into the strato- driven by press releases rather than Arctic ozone "hole" in 1989, nor in sphere that were actually depleting proven science. any other year. The CFC ozone theo- the ozone iayer in the tropical re- What really happened? As best as rytssimplynotgoodenoughtopre- gions. one can tell - absent any published dict chlorine values or ozone deple- And, curiously, the Pinatubo information that can be checked by tion. presareleasepaeeedoverthefactthat independent scientists - a chlorine The NASA press release may depletion at low latitudes would lead detector, flying on a NASA research have told the truth, but it didn't tell to large increases of surface ultra-vi- aircraft in the northern stratosphere, the whole truth. It did not reveal that olet radiation - with all of the con- encounteredhighconcentmtionsof chlorineatomacyclebackandforth sequenceeusuallyreservedforozone •an active form of chlorine, capable of between an active and inactive form, changes believed to be man-made: attacking ozone. depending on the presence of strato- Inereaeeeinakineancer,cataracte, But, of course. it required careful spheric ice particles, which in turn . plankton death, etc. Apparently, nat- reading of the artfully worded docu- depend on whatever happens to be ural ozone changes don't count. ment to discover that nothing at all the tempereture. Stratospheric Why did NASA bave to release was happening to ozone. Most press "weather" has become the pacing the information on Feb. 4 when the reports fell into the trap. variable for ozone depletion, not the experiments were to continue The NASA announcement was levelofchlorine.Thisvital'pieceof thtoughtheendofMarch?Officiels based on a peak chlorine reading, information was withheld felt they had to warn the pub6c of an whichoccuaedonJan.20."Peak" ThePress release claimed that the "everinereasiitgdengerofozonede- implies,however.thatreadingswere source of thechlorinewas"mainly pletion." lower - perhaps much lower - both CFCs,"aman-madechemicalwidely Amorelikelyexplanationiathat 0 tf NASA waited until the end of the experiment and did not find an ozone hole, any announcement would im- mediately lose its publicity value. By holding aut the possibility, however slim, that a hole might develop, the NASA project could improve its bud- get outlook and perhaps even have a policy impact. NASA's game plan has proved successful. (Shortly after the announcement, the "threatening' chlorine values dropped by 75 per- cent. Now the winter is over, and there has been no Arctic ozone hole.) Members of Congress are begin- ning to ask if those two weeks be- tween the peak observation and the NASA announcement allowed enough time for independent scien- titic scrutiny, and for coordination of an accelerated CFC phase-out with all of the affectedindustries and gov- ernment agencies. Has the White House fully considered whether CFC substitutes will be readily available? Will the substitutes be as non-toxic, non-carcinogenic, non-flammable andefficientas CFCe? Some of the substitutes being tested have produced tumors in rats; others have proved to be flammable in kitchen refrigerators. Many of them will require that existing equip- ment, currently worth more than $135 billion in the United States alone, be modified or replaced. And envimnmental activists are already clamoring for the early elimi- nation of CFC substitutes because they are not suffrciently "ozone friendly." One.]ast item - a scientific nug- get. A research paper by two Belgian scientists, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research, appears to demonstrate that the frequently claimedozone depletion, based on global data from surface stations over the last 30 years, disappears com- pletely when one corrects for the in- terfering effects on the measure- ments by atmospheric sulfur dioxide. If confirmed, this discovery would throw all of our fears about ozone de- pletion into a cocked hat. As they say in the Alar business, how do you like them apples?  S. Fred Singer is professor of en- vironmeatal sciencee at the University of Virginia, now on leave, and directs the Science & Environmental Policy Project in Washington, D.C. He designed the currently used instrument for measurin&ozone from satellites. 2074144038