03 General Information (sci.environment)
Description
This article is from the Ozone Depletion: Stratospheric Chlorine and Bromine FAQ, by Robert Parson rparson@spot.colorado.edu with numerous contributions by others.
03 General Information (sci.environment)
This part deals not with ozone depletion per se (that is covered
in Part I) but rather with the sources and sinks of chlorine and
bromine in the stratosphere. Special attention is devoted to the
evidence that most of the chlorine comes from the photolysis of
CFC's and related compounds. Instead of relying upon qualitative
statements about relative lifetimes, solubilities, and so forth, I
have tried to give a sense of the actual magnitudes involved.
Fundamentally, this Part of the FAQ is about measurements, and I
have therefore included some tables to illustrate trends; the
data that I reproduce is in every case a small fraction of what
has actually been published. In the first section I state the
present assessment of stratospheric chlorine sources and trends,
and then in the next section I discuss the evidence that leads to
those conclusions. After a brief discussion of Bromine and Iodine in
section 3, I answer the most familiar challenges that have been
raised in section 4. Only these last are actually "Frequently Asked
Questions"; however I have found the Question/Answer format to be
useful in clarifying the issues in my mind even when the questions
are rhetorical, so I have kept to it.
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