Tuesday, August 31, 2010

6 of 24 postsDON'T BLAME CFC FOR OZONE DEPLETION

6 of 24 posts


OZONE DEPLETION BY CFC IS IMPOSSIBLE
Dr. Dev Bahadur Dongol
Don’t Blame CFC
Our immediate climatic atmosphere (troposphere) IS NOT LAYERED. It is a homogenous mixture of gases because it is moving all the time; therefore it is thoroughly mixed up. So there is no layer of gases that reflects heat because gases move upwards when it is heated. It releases heat when reaches a colder zone. Above climatic atmosphere is Ozonosphere. We all know the air becomes thinner as we go higher. So lighter gases are situated at higher altitude and heavier gases are situated near the earth due to the gravitational pull of the earth. So the troposphere has comparatively all the heavy gases. Compared to the atmosphere near the surface of the earth the ozone layer is very thin. This we can guess by considering the fact that the mountaineers have to carry oxygen with them even to climb mountains that are much lower than Mount Everest. Ozone is situated even at higher altitude, 30,000 feet. So naturally ozone layer must be thinner than oxygen available at the height of the Mount Everest.
Ozone layer works on ‘make and break’ principle, as O3 breaks into three atoms of oxygen because of the heat of the Ultraviolet ray from the Sun. But oxygen cannot stay as atom alone, it has to be in the molecular form by combining with another atoms or molecules. Since only oxygen is available in the ozonosphere it combines with other atoms of oxygen and again becomes ozone; by doing that it releases heat it absorbed as ozone molecules. But as soon as it becomes ozone the continuously available Ultraviolet rays from the Sun again breaks the ozone molecules into atoms of oxygen. This is how ozone blocks some heat from the Sun.
CFC is Chloro–Fluoro-Carbon (Cl¬2 Fl2 C) and has two atoms of chlorine, two atoms of fluorine and one atom of carbon. Carbon dioxide (CO2) has one atom of carbon and two atoms of oxygen. Ozone is O3 or three atoms of Oxygen combined and it is unstable because it breaks into single oxygen atoms when heated.
Molecular weights, comparative weights of O2, CO2, O3 and Chlorofluorocarbon (Hydrogen is lightest gas so its weight is standardized as 1, Oxygen is 16, carbon is 12, chlorine is 35, and fluorine is 19) are as follow:
Oxygen is 16X2 =32, carbon dioxide is 12 + 16X2 = 44, Chlorofluorocarbon (CFC - Cl¬2 Fl2 C) is 35X2 + 19X2 + 12 = 120, Ozone (O3) is 16X3 = 48 and atomic oxygen is 16; that’s why ozone layer can stay at higher altitude than our immediate atmosphere.
Concentration of CO2 is nil in the Ozonosphere as this gas is heavier than O2. CFC is very heavy (almost three times heavier than CO2) and eight times heavier than oxygen. So it is quite obvious that it can’t reach the height where ozone layer is situated. Since CFC molecules can’t reach to that height, then how it can deplete ozone without being in contact with Ozone? So it is very unscientific to blame CFC for the depletion of Ozone layer.
Better explanation of Ozone depletion - jet flights
Every day millions of jet flight takes place in the world. They all fly at the height of 30,000 ft where the ozone layer lies. They carry fuel with them to burn. For burning the fuel they need huge quantity of oxygen. They consume oxygen either from the climatic atmosphere (Troposphere) or Ozonosphere (mainly) that is situated just above the troposphere. Anyone can guess how much oxygen the millions of flights of the planes and the jet planes are using up. So it is not difficult to accuse these flights for causing the depletion of Ozone.
Suggestion
Banning the jet planes to fly higher than 25,000 feet will definitely save our Ozone layer without doubt.
Email: dev.dangol@yahoo.co.uk

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