Science: Culprits of The Stratosphere

New evidence that man-made chemicals are depleting the ozone

Representatives from 35 countries met in Montreal last week to hammer out an agreement that would limit man-made damage to the atmosphere's protective ozone layer. As they deliberated, the British journal Nature published a study offering the strongest evidence so far that man-made compounds called chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are the culprits. Crofton Farmer, principal author of the study and an atmospheric physicist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., reported that data gathered last year in the Antarctic are "entirely consistent" with the premise that CFCs -- used in refrigeration devices and as ingredients in plastic foams -- are destroying the...

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