IN 1994, you would have been hard-pressed to find anyone talking about plastic pollution, and concern about climate change was still the preserve of a fringe few. The hole in the ozone layer above the Antarctic, however – now that was a burning issue.
The Montreal Protocol, which aimed to phase out ozone-depleting substances such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), had only come into effect in 1989. It was too early to know whether it was making any difference, so we found one physicist’s suggestion to geoengineer a solution “grandiose”.
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“Alfred Wong, from the University of California at Los Angeles, would like to hoist giant electronic ‘curtains’ into the stratosphere” to carry out renovation work on the hole, we reported. Admittedly, “his ideas have met with scepticism from atmospheric scientists”.
Essentially, the concept consisted of suspending sheets of negative charge from platforms held aloft by helium balloons. These charges would ionise highly reactive ozone-eating chlorine atoms, rendering them harmless. Perhaps it was all just an excuse to run an article with the title “Is it curtains for the ozone hole?“. But Wong had credentials as co-director of UCLA’s plasma physics laboratory, and the idea had been published in the journal Physical Review Letters.
Wong later fleshed out his plan, calling for 25 platforms floating 40 kilometres above each pole. “The first [platform] will cost $35 million, and thereafter each one will cost $15 million,” he in 1996.
Glittering airships never did draw gigantic curtains majestically above the poles. The Montreal Protocol – now often held up as a model of international cooperation – does seem to have helped the ozone layer turn the corner. Even so, its recovery is an achingly slow process that will take until at least the middle of this century. Recently, the decline in CFC emissions has slowed, with illegal emissions from factories in China identified as the culprit just last week.
Things didn’t end so well for Wong. As the Daily Bruin , the then retired professor was fined $1.7 million and sentenced to six months of home detention for submitting fraudulent invoices in connection with a contract for the US government. Whether it was to save the ozone layer, the reports don’t say.
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