Articles | Volume 24, issue 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-2783-2024
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-2783-2024
Opinion
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01 Mar 2024
Opinion | Highlight paper |  | 01 Mar 2024

Opinion: Stratospheric ozone – depletion, recovery and new challenges

Martyn P. Chipperfield and Slimane Bekki

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This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
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Cited articles

Adcock, K. E., Fraser, P. J., Hall, B. D., Langenfelds, R. L., Lee, G., Montzka, S. A., Oram, D. E., Röckmann, T., Stroh, F., Sturges, W. T., Vogel, B., and Laube, J. C.: Aircraft-based observations of ozone-depleting substances in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere in and above the Asian summer monsoon, J. Geophys. Res., 126, e2020JD033137, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020JD033137, 2020. 
Ansmann, A., Ohneiser, K., Chudnovsky, A., Knopf, D. A., Eloranta, E. W., Villanueva, D., Seifert, P., Radenz, M., Barja, B., Zamorano, F., Jimenez, C., Engelmann, R., Baars, H., Griesche, H., Hofer, J., Althausen, D., and Wandinger, U.: Ozone depletion in the Arctic and Antarctic stratosphere induced by wildfire smoke, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 11701–11726, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-11701-2022, 2022. 
Arosio, C., Rozanov, A., Malinina, E., Eichmann, K.-U., von Clarmann, T., and Burrows, J. P.: Retrieval of ozone profiles from OMPS limb scattering observations, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 11, 2135–2149, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-2135-2018, 2018. 
Executive editor
The paper provides an informative and up-to-date overview of the progress made in understanding the evolution of the stratospheric ozone layer since the introduction of the Montreal Protocol to a broad and interested readership. It discusses new evidence that, despite the success of the Montreal Protocol, the stratospheric ozone layer will not necessarily return in the long term to the state it was in before the start of the release of CFCs (before 1970). New challenges arise, due to man-made climate change or natural extreme events like volcanic eruptions that have been shown to impact the ozone layer. The authors' appeal is therefore to continue to closely monitor the state of the stratospheric ozone layer, which is important for life, in the future.
Short summary
We give a personal perspective on recent issues related to the depletion of stratospheric ozone and some newly emerging challenges. We first provide a brief review of historic work on understanding the ozone layer and review ozone recovery from the effects of halogenated source gases and the Montreal Protocol. We then discuss the recent observations of ozone depletion from Australian fires in early 2020 and the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Ha'apai volcano in January 2022.
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