I was absolutely fascinated by this story which appeared on The Register recently. If you haven’t read then go and read it. Nothing unusual in there you might think. Except that one of the quotes caught my attention… “This year’s ozone hole was less centred on the South Pole as in other years, which allowed it to mix with warmer air, reducing the growth of the hole because ozone is depleted at temperatures less than -78 degrees Celsius,”. Now I didn’t appreciate this fact. I assumed that ozone disappeared under all conditions. However, from the quote in the story it appears that ozone disappears faster when conditions are cold. Mix the cold air under the hole with slightly warmer air and the disappearance of ozone happens at a slower rate.

Which leads me on to my theory. If the ozone layer is being depleted (and I’m not getting into a discussion on that - I think it’s fairly widely accepted that it is) then this is because of man-made pollutants causing clouds. Ok no problems so far. But the reduction of the ozone layer is leading to “global warming”. So the atmosphere is getting warmer. Which means there will be less times when the temperature reaches -78 degrees celsius, which means there will be less times when the ozone hole is growing. So surely this is a good thing? If a slight warming of the planet is leading to less ozone disappearing then how can global warming be a bad thing?

Now, if we assume that the Earth is a living, breathing organism then there must be a possibility that it is controlling it’s own conditions,including average temperatures across the surface of the planet. If the earth is raising its own temperatures in an effort to reduce the loss of ozone, then by putting our own measures in place to reduce carbon omissions, we may actually be making the situation worse! Keeping the temperature low makes the ozone disappear faster, thereby de-stabilising the planet even further!

So, are we on the verge of triggering the next Ice Age by throwing the planet into a de-stabilised state? Can global warming be a good thing? Should we all be burning more carbon to save the ozone layer? Is the Earth, in fact, sentient and can control it’s own environment? Discuss…