Environment A Breath of Fresh Air

By GLENN GARELIK

To paraphrase that famous remark about the weather, everyone talks about the ozone layer, but no one does anything about it. Though evidence has mounted that man-made compounds called chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are destroying the screen of ozone-enriched air that helps shield the earth from the sun's dangerous radiation, the world's nations have been slow to develop a consensus on how to cope with the problem.

Last week the world, or at least a part of it, finally did something. At a conference in Montreal sponsored by the United Nations Environment Program, 24 countries signed a milestone accord that promised to halve production and use of ozone-destroying chemicals by 1999. "There has never been an agreement like this on a global scale," exulted Winfried Lang of Austria, chairman of the conference. Said Lee Thomas, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency: "The signing shows an unprecedented degree of cooperation among nations of the world in balancing economic development and environmental protection."

The Montreal Protocol is aimed at reducing CFCs, which are used as coolants in refrigerators and air conditioners and are an important ingredient in aerosols and plastic foams. The pact would limit the use of an ozone- destroying group of fire-suppressant chemicals called halons, which some scientists believe cause as much as 20 times the damage of CFCs. Scientists estimate that overall as much as 7% of the ozone belt, which stretches six to 30 miles above the earth, has already been destroyed. Moreover, researchers have found evidence of "holes" in the shield, including one above Antarctica that approaches the size of the continental U.S. As the world's ozone layer deteriorates, the sun's radiation could lead to a dramatic increase in skin cancer and cataracts, along with a lowered resistance to infection. It could damage plant life, both directly and as a result of a general warming trend; that warming could lead to a disastrous rise in sea levels.

Among the protocol's signers are the U.S., Canada, Japan and the twelve- nation European Community; the U.S. and the E.C. annually produce about three- fourths of the world's 1 million tons of CFCs. The only major producer of CFCs that has not yet endorsed the treaty is the Soviet Union, whose representatives said the document would have to be studied in Moscow first. However, Vladimir Zakharov, the chief Soviet delegate, predicted his country would eventually approve the pact.

The Montreal negotiations, which capped nearly five years of talks, lasted nine days and involved some 150 scientists, environmentalists and industry representatives. The protocol allows developing countries to increase CFC use for ten years, in the interest of making more available to them items like refrigerators. It permits the Soviet Union, which plans its economy in five- year cycles, to go ahead with production scheduled through 1990. Thus the amount of the chemicals produced worldwide will actually grow by as much as 15% in the coming decade, cutting the real decrease by 1999 to just 35%.

The agreement will take effect only after each of the signatory countries has ratified it and developed respective laws and sanctions, according to Mostafa Tolba, executive director of the U.N. group; he expects that process to take about a year. Even if the pact fulfills its goal, Tolba estimates, the world's ozone will diminish by at least 2% more during the next century. That is not a minor affair: every 1% depletion is believed to result in a 6% increase in skin cancers. Moreover, major potential users of CFCs, like India, may prove reluctant to cooperate with the accord, lest it handicap their development.

The costs of the treaty could prove considerable. CFCs have become popular because they are generally safe to apply and relatively cheap to produce. But Joseph Steed, environmental manager for Du Pont, whose annual production of CFCs (under the brand name Freon) is valued at $600 million, warns that adoption of the protocol will mean a lengthy and expensive search for alternatives and that the costs will be passed on to consumers.

Nonetheless, most of those present at Montreal praised the agreement. The treaty has inspired Canadian officials to renew their campaign to reach an accord with the U.S. on another environmental danger: acid rain and snow that result from the sulfurous emissions of coal-fired power plants. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency acknowledges that half the acid rain that falls on eastern Canada originates south of the U.S.-Canada border. "The Americans can agree on target dates and objectives in reducing ozone- destroying chemicals," observed Clifford Lincoln, Quebec Environment Minister. "Why not do the same with acid rain?"

The charge drew a sharp rebuttal from the EPA's Lee Thomas, who cited a 25% reduction in offending emissions over the past decade, despite rising U.S. coal consumption. As if to bolster the defense, a Reagan Administration group formed in 1980 to study the problem asserted the next day in an interim report that there was little evidence of environmental damage from acid rain and "no demonstrated effects" on human health. That assertion, retorted Canada's Environment Minister, Tom McMillan, was nothing other than "bad science and bad policy."

With reporting by Peter Stoler/Ottawa and Nancy Traver/Montreal