Restoration of the ozone layer is back on track

Recovery of the ozone layer could happen within a few decades, scientists said in a U.N.-backed report, as China has nearly eliminated rogue chemical emissions. Ozone levels between the polar regions are expected to reach pre-1980 levels by 2040, if current policies continue, and ozone holes should also recover.

In 2018, scientists revealed that global emissions of CFC-11, a chemical that was most likely used in China to make foam insulation, had increased since 2012. Investigations by The Times and others strongly suggested that small factories in eastern China that were disregarding the global ban were the source. Those new emissions had threatened to undermine the Montreal Protocol, the treaty negotiated in the 1980s to phase out the use of chlorofluorocarbons in favor of more benign chemicals after it was discovered that chlorofluorocarbons were depleting atmospheric ozone.