Hearing on Stratospheric Ozone
House Science Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Environment

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen,

My name is S. Fred Singer. I am professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia and the founder and president of The Science & Environmental Policy Project in Fairfax, Virginia, a non-partisan non-profit research group. I hold a skeptical view on the adequacy of the science that supports our current stratospheric ozone policy--namely, to phase out chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) on an accelerated schedule.

Vice President Al Gore keeps referring to scientist skeptics as a "tiny minority outside the mainstream." Others try to discredit scientist skeptics by lumping them together with fringe political groups. To counter such misrepresentations, let me present my general scientific qualifications and those relevant to the ozone issue.

Relevant Background

: I hold a degree in engineering from Ohio State and a Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University. For more than 40 years, I have specialized in atmospheric and space physics. I received a Special Commendation from President Eisenhower for the early design of satellites. In 1962, I established the U.S. Weather Satellite Service, served as its first director, and received a Gold Medal award from the U.S. Department of Commerce for this contribution.

Early in my career I devised the instrument used to measure stratospheric ozone from satellites. As a Deputy Assistant Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 1971, I chaired an interdepartmental panel of scientists looking into the possible effects on stratospheric ozone of a proposed fleet of supersonic transports (SSTs). Ours was the first group to examine possible damage to the ozone layer from human activities and look into potential health consequences, including skin cancers. During this period I published the hypothesis that anthropogenic methane, from cattle raising and rice growing, could deplete stratospheric ozone. In the late 1980s I served as Chief Scientist of the U.S. Department of Transportation and also provided expert advice to the White House on the ozone issue.

Examples of Failures of Scientific Integrity:

Today's hearing on scientific integrity as related to the stratospheric ozone layer is well timed. The United Nations Environment Programme and the secretariat for the Montreal Protocol [on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer] designated September 16 as the first annual International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer. The White House, spurred on by the EPA, has extended the celebration into a whole week. This should remind us that ozone depletion is no longer just a scientific debate; entrenched domestic and international bureaucracies, not to mention commercial interests, now have a considerable stake in keeping alive fears of an ozone catastrophe.

This morning, I will touch on several topics that relate to the theme of scientific integrity:

• First, I want to state clearly that there is no scientific consensus on ozone depletion or its consequences. "Consensus" is a political concept, not a scientific one. It is used mainly to gain reassurance for an ideological position and to avoid having to examine the scientific arguments in detail. Consensus has been claimed also for the global warming issue. The official report from the UN-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change mentions the existence of "minority" views, but the editors could not, or perhaps would not, "accommodate" them. The IPCC editors thus achieved "consensus" by ignoring contrary evidence and dissenting views. Much the same has been true in the ozone issue.

  In view of the present policy to ban CFCs by the end of 1995, why spend a lot of energy fighting a fait accompli? I think the best answer was given by an environmental activist on an ABC News-"Nightline" television program in February 1994. Michael Oppenheimer of the Environmental Defense Fund complained that "if [skeptical scientists] can get the public to believe that ozone wasn't worth acting on, that they [the public] were led in the wrong direction..., then there is no reason for the public to believe anything about any environmental issue." Given the activist groups' miserable record of unfounded scares about the global environment, such a reaction may be warranted.

• Next, I want the record to show that the 1987 Montreal Protocol [on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer] was negotiated without adequate concern for scientific evidence. The chief U.S. negotiator, State Department official Richard Benedick, proudly revealed in his 1991 book, Ozone Diplomacy, on page 2: "Perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of the treaty was its imposition of substantial short-term economic costs...against unproved future dangers-- dangers that rested on scientific theories rather than on firm data." Again, on page 18: "In July 1987, practically on the eve of the final negotiating session in Montreal, NOAA concluded that the 'scientific community is currently divided as to whether existing data on ozone trends provides sufficient evidence... that a chlorine-induced ozone destruction is occurring.'"

  Benedick does not mention the fact that, as late as 1988, published evidence on stratospheric chlorine showed no upward trend, thus indicating that neither CFCs nor other manmade chemicals were contributing significantly to the total--over and above known natural sources like volcanoes and oceans. An article by MIT professor Ronald Prinn, in a book edited by Prof. Sherwood Rowland and published in 1988, makes this point quite clear.

  It is apparent from the above quotes that the negotiators and their scientific supporters were not at all inhibited by the absence of scientific evidence--or indeed by the presence of contrary information.

• Third, the self-constituted Ozone Trends Panel first announced the existence of global ozone depletion in a March 1988 press conference, but did not present its supporting analysis for review until much later. A study of the OTP data by two independent American scientists, which was widely distributed as a preprint, showed clearly that, even after they thought they had successfully "subtracted" the natural variations by statistical methods, the so-called "depletion trend" depended on the choice of time interval--i.e., the year the analysis starts and ends. Curiously, this result, which shows the dominance of the large (natural) solar-cycle variation of ozone, was left out of a later published paper involving the same authors as collaborators with government scientists.

  There is also a still unresolved dispute about the quality of the data themselves. The OTP, and the subsequent UN-sponsored assessment groups, have never grappled with objections published by two Belgian researchers in 1992. These scientists showed that the ozone readings were contaminated by air pollution and termed the reported ozone trend "fictitious." Because of similar absorption of ultraviolet, decreases in sulfur dioxide, brought about by reduced industrial emissions, were being falsely read as decreases in ozone.

  Global ozone depletion is still a controversial subject. Starting with the OTP press conference, depletion has generally been reported to be "worse than expected." This statement should produce the logical conclusion that the CFC- ozone theory (on which "expectation" must be based) is wrong, or the observations are wrong, or they are both wrong.

• Fourth, another press conference, arranged by NASA on February 3, 1992-- during crucial Congressional hearings on the NASA budget and well before the end of the series of stratospheric observations--implied the threat of an Arctic ozone hole. The resulting nationwide scare led the Bush White House to advance the phaseout of CFCs to December 31, 1995.

  The Arctic ozone hole never happened--something NASA scientists could have predicted at the time of the press conference. Information leaked to a journalist indicated that NASA scientists had mid-January satellite data showing that stratospheric chlorine was already in decline. Yet the agency went ahead with the February 3 press conference and refused to reveal this information and allay public fears until a second NASA press conference three months later, on April 30.

• Fifth, the "smoking gun" of ozone depletion activists is, of course, an increasing trend of solar ultraviolet radiation at the earth's surface. All of the published evidence before November 1993 had shown no such trend. Then, a research paper in Science magazine claimed upward trends of as much as 35 percent per year--without giving any estimate of the margin of error. This widely touted result, featured in a press release by Science and still being cited by the EPA and environmental activist groups, was shown to be completely spurious. The analysis was based on faulty statistics; the "trend" was zero.

  Only later was it learned that the paper had been first submitted to the British scientific journal Nature, but had been rejected in the peer-review process. It's still somewhat of a mystery how this article passed the review process of Science.

  There is still no evidence for an increased trend of surface UV to match a putative ozone depletion trend.

• Finally, there is the Setlow experiment, which demonstrates that malignant melanoma skin cancers are mainly caused by a region of the UV spectrum that is not absorbed by ozone and therefore not affected by changes in the ozone layer. When the EPA is not ignoring this result, it is attacking it on the basis that Setlow experimented with fish and that fish are not people. (Ironically, the EPA expresses no such qualms when using rats to determine the carcinogenicity of chemicals.) In the meantime, the EPA has resisted Congressional requests to revise its cost-benefit analysis backing the Montreal Protocol, which was based on the wholly unjustified assumption of 3 million additional skin cancer deaths.

The bottom line is this: Currently available scientific evidence does not support a ban on the production of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs or freons), halons, and especially methyl bromide. There certainly is no justification for the accelerated phaseout of CFCs, which was instituted in 1992 on nothing more than a highly questionable and widely criticized NASA press conference. Yet because of the absence of full scientific debate of the evidence, relying instead on unproven theories, we now have an international treaty that will conservatively cost the U.S. economy some $100 billion dollars.

The history of the CFC-ozone depletion issue is rife with examples of the breakdown of scientific integrity: selective use of data, faulty application of statistics, disregard of contrary evidence, and other scientific distortions. The policy before and since the Montreal Protocol has been driven by wild and irresponsible scare stories: EPA's estimate of millions of additional skin cancer deaths, damage to immune systems, blind sheep in Chile, the worldwide disappearance of frogs, plankton death, the collapse of agriculture and ecosystems.

The latest example of "science by press release" is the scare story about a massive ozone hole, fed to the media in Sept. 1995 by the Geneva-based World Meteorological Organization. "At its present rate of growth [it] might grow to record-breaking size...," said Rumen Bojkov, a well-known WMO alarmist. But then again, it might not--according to NASA scientist Paul Newman. Australian meteorologist Paul Lehmann agrees: The hole will change its shape, volume, and size daily as it grows; he concludes that its final size is not predictable by comparing data now with those of a year ago.

These scare stories cannot pass what I call the common-sense test: A projected 10 percent UV increase from a worst-case global ozone depletion is the equivalent of moving just 60 miles closer to the equator, say from Washington, D.C., to Richmond, Virginia. New Yorkers moving to Florida experience a more than 200 percent increase in UV because of the change in latitude. Why aren't they dropping like flies? Mail-order nurseries in the upper midwest ship field-grown plants all over the United States. Why don't these plants die?

Scientists involved in ozone research have known these facts from the beginning, but only a few have acknowledged them publicly.

FROM: CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS RELATED TO THE SEPT. 20, 1995 HEARING:

1. Please list peer-reviewed scientific journals in which you have published.

(Answer) Journal of the Franklin Institute, Physical Review, Physical Review Letters, Reviews of Geophysics, Journal of Geophysical Research, Transactions of the American Geophysical Union, Astrophysical Journal, Physics of Fluids, Icarus, Environmental Geology, Environmental Conservation, Environmental Science and Technology, Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics, Science, Nature. This is not a complete list; there may also be others. I have published well over 150 scientific papers.

2. Your name is not listed as a contributor or reviewer in the 1994 WMO Ozone Assessment. Why is that?

(Answer) It has been the sad experience of many of my colleagues that their critical comments and objections are ignored by the editors, but that their names are then cited as if they approved of the Assessment. For example, in the 1990 IPCC Report, the editors explicitly acknowledged the existence of dissenting views, but then stated that they "could not accommodate them." The editors did not identify the dissenters, did not reveal how many dissented, nor state the substance of the dissenting views.

The 7-page list of scientists (exhibited also by witness Mary Nichols as evidence of a "consensus") certainly looks impressive; but, I would note, there is no way of determining how many actually agree with the overall conclusions of the Assessment.

3. You appended to your testimony your recent publication in the Journal of the Franklin Institute. Does it contain new scientific information?

(Answer) It is primarily an up-to-date review of the evidence, but it also contains some new information. It points out for the first time that a theoretical paper (by Ravishankara et al.) and an experimental paper (by Wennberg et al.), both published in Science in 1994, lead to the interpretation that the major destroyer of ozone in the lower stratosphere derives from water vapor, rather than from CFCs. But water vapor is now increasing, likely because of human activities.* If this hypothesis is correct, then a ban on CFC production would not achieve the desired result.

4. In his testimony Dr. Watson doubts your hypothesis that increasing levels of atmospheric methane and carbon dioxide are causing the Antarctic ozone hole. Please comment.

(Answer) Dr. Watson misquotes me and is wrong as well. It is generally accepted that chlorine cannot remove ozone without the presence of ice crystals. Ice crystals require water vapor and low temperatures. In 1988, I published the hypothesis that ice crystals are rate-limiting for ozone removal, rather than just the concentration of chlorine; increasing methane increases stratospheric water vapor and carbon dioxide lowers the temperature.* Dr. Watson may not be aware that the same idea was published more recently by Blake and Rowland, without attribution to my earlier paper.

5. The WMO released a report this month (September 1995) claiming a more rapid increase in the Antarctic ozone hole. What is your comment?

(Answer) It is generally agreed that the AOH is controlled more by climatic factors than by the concentration of atmospheric CFCs, more or less as I hypothesized in 1988.* I note, for example, that the 1994 hole was smaller than the 1992 and 1993 events, but of course there was no press release. With respect to 1995, I will let other scientists speak to the issue:

The latest example of "science by press release" is the scare story about a massive ozone hole, fed to the media in Sept. 1995 by the Geneva-based World Meteorological Organization. "At its present rate of growth [it] might grow to record-breaking size...," said Rumen Bojkov, a well-known WMO alarmist. But then again, it might not--according to NASA scientist Paul Newman. Australian meteorologist Paul Lehmann agrees: The hole will change its shape, volume, and size daily as it grows; he concludes that its final size is not predictable by comparing data now with those of a year ago.

6. Please comment on EPA's cost-benefit analysis for a CFC ban, and comment particularly on the costs and benefits for poorer nations.

(Answer) I am completely puzzled by the unrealistic benefit numbers, up to $32 trillion, put forth by EPA. The numbers seem to be growing, in spite of the reduced skin cancer threat from a putative ozone depletion. Their methodology should be presented in detail and then carefully examined. I suspect that they've not dealt realistically with the number of deaths from melanoma and non- melanoma skin cancers. I also suspect that they have used an unrealistic discount rate in arriving at a benefit-to-cost ratio of 700 to 1000.

As far as tropical nations are concerned, their benefits would be close to zero, since ozone is not predicted to be depleted in the equatorial region. On the other hand, their costs in terms of morbidity and mortality will be very much higher than in developed countries, since they will find it more difficult to purchase new air conditioners and refrigerators.

7. The American Academy of Dermatology has linked melanoma and the Antarctic ozone hole. Please comment.

(Answer) It is true that Dr. Darrell Rigel has testified that skin cancer incidence has more than doubled since the AOH developed in the late 1970s. But of course, his statement is misleading, or perhaps even designed to mislead:

• An Antarctic ozone depletion cannot possibly affect skin cancer rates in the United States, some 10,000 miles away.

• Cancers develop only after a latency period of decades.

• Melanoma skin cancers have been increasing, by some 800 percent since 1935, clearly related to lifestyle changes and not to any change in ozone.

(Answer) I believe his result is incorrect. It is derived by noting that the incidence of NMSC is five times greater in Albuquerque than in Seattle; (clear- sky) UV intensity increases by a factor of 2.5 as one moves towards the equator. But one cannot simply relate the ratio of skin cancers to the ratio of UV-B. Watson's high ratio of 2:1 hides two unjustified assumptions: (i) that the fraction of clear days in Seattle is equal to the number of clear days in Albuquerque, and (ii) that people in Albuquerque walk around in raincoats rather than short-sleeved shirts and typically get no more body exposure per day than people in Seattle. When these two assumptions are allowed for, the skin cancer- to-UV ratio may well drop by a large factor.

9. Please comment on the need and urgency for a production ban on methyl bromide.

(Answer) I have addressed this issue on August 1, 1995, in testimony to the House Commerce Committee, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. Briefly:

• Methyl bromide (MeBr) comes mainly from natural sources, like the ocean.

• MeBr has a lifetime in the atmosphere of only about 1 year, unlike CFCs. This means that if a problem arises and production is stopped, the enhanced level will quickly decay down to the natural level.

• I note that Dr. Watson's testimony constantly refers to "stratospheric chlorine and bromine." But there is no published evidence I know of that stratospheric bromine is increasing. The amounts present there are minute and extremely difficult to detect.

(Answer) As I stated in my oral testimony, I do not have a vested interest either for or against CFCs or other chemicals. Since CFCs are increasing in the atmosphere, a tax rather than production controls might be the most appropriate policy measure. A higher price would encourage both conservation and recycling, and thereby reduce the amounts released into the atmosphere.

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* "Does the Antarctic ozone hole have a future?" Eos 69, 1588 (1988)

11. You have expressed doubts about the reality of ozone depletion. Please explain.

(Answer) It is difficult if not impossible to remove the natural variations from the ozone record in order to detect the existence of a small downward trend-- presumably due to manmade chemicals. The attached graph, taken from a research paper by NOAA scientist Jim Angell, tells the story. It shows the strong, but not perfect correlation between total ozone and sunspot number, since global ozone measurements were started in 1957. It also shows that each sunspot cycle is different. Unfortunately, it would require ozone data over many cycles to permit the statistical removal of the sunspot variation from the ozone record and allow reliable extraction of a small, long-term trend.

The lower graph displays another phenomenon: the great variability of the sunspot maximum over the last 300 years, showing the existence of natural trends lasting for decades. This means that an observed ozone trend, even if real, may not necessarily be anthropogenic; it could be natural.

is there evidence for a long-term upward trend of surface UV-B?

The connection between the emission of CFCs into the atmosphere and the incidence of skin cancers is a complicated affair involving intermediate steps. The crucial parameter may be the intensity of solar ultraviolet radiation reaching the Earth's surface. Is there any credible evidence for a long-term increasing trend of UV to match the claimed decreasing trend of stratospheric ozone?

If one reads the Sept. 20, 1995, testimony of Dr. Robert Watson, Associate Director of Environment of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and co-chairman of the UN-sponsored Ozone Assessment, the answer would appear to be YES. But a more careful reading shows that the answer is clearly NO.

Watson begins with a semantic gambit: "...clouds and other factors precluded the unequivocal identification of a long-term trend in surface UV radiation." And again, in the next paragraph: "[it] is highly unlikely that there is no long- term trend in UV-B." This is not exactly a ringing endorsement; it simply means that he has no credible evidence for a long-term trend.

Next, Watson is forced to deal with a refereed paper (by J.Scotto et al) published in the peer-reviewed journal Science, which actually showed a downward trend for UV over an 11-year period at several of the 8 US measurement locations. Watson first questions the calibration and low sensitivity of the instrument--a facile statement. He next claims that the record is too noisy to extract a reliable trend, because of large day-to-day changes. Here Watson introduces a double standard; the same arguments can be applied to the ozone record. Finally, Watson blames increasing air pollution for the observed downward trend. The problem with this explanation is that pollution in the United States has been decreasing thanks to the Clean Air Act.

Watson, and others like him, have latched on to a Canadian paper published in Science in November 1993. It claims to have observed upward trends of UV- B, between 1989 and 1993, of as much as 35% per year! This paper became something of a "Holy Grail" for ozone depletion zealots. Press releases announced the paper even before it was published, and led to endorsements from Dr. Michael Oppenheimer of the Environmental Defense Fund and from Prof. Sherwood Rowland, who was quoted: "Now at last we have good data." He spoke too soon; the statistical analysis was shown to be faulty and the trend became essentially zero.

Knowing of this debacle, Watson now switches locations and introduces a non sequitur. He points to "large increases of surface UV...in Antarctica...during the period of the seasonal ozone 'hole'." He fails to mention however, that the UV decreases to its prior value when the ozone layer recovers. Again--no trend.

Finally, Watson tries a sleight-of-hand. Like a magician, he creates the illusion that the TOMS satellite has measured an upward UV trend. But the TOMS instrument cannot measure the UV-B reaching the surface. Indeed, a careful reading of Watson's testimony reveals that the UV intensities are derived (by calculation) from TOMS, and not measured directly.

We are then left with no UV trend--in spite of a claimed ozone depletion trend.

Some Comments by Dr. S.Fred Singer on the Sept.20, 1995 Hearing

Is There a Long-Term Trend in Ultraviolet Radiation?

"The quality and quantity of UV measurements has increased greatly in the last few years. Variations among measurements from different instruments are diminishing toward the 5% level. Long-term trend detection is still a problem, with little historical data available for baseline estimation." (Emphasis added)

This paragraph comes from the Executive Summary (p.iii) of the report "Environmental Effects of Ozone Depletion: 1994 Assessment," published by the UN Environment Program in November 1994. The quote confirms that there is no observational evidence for a long-term UV trend. It also makes it clear that alleged ozone trends that are based on surface observations on UV suffer from inter-instrument comparisons and from the dearth of historical data.

Truthfulness of Witness?

During the hearing, Congresswoman Lynn Rivers asked Drs. Watson, Albritton, Setlow, and Kripke if they were familiar with the Journal of the Franklin Institute. The purpose was to discredit my testimony since I published there (vol. 332A, pp.61-66, 1995) a review article on the ozone-CFC issue and appended a copy to my testimony.

Dr. Watson replied that the journal came to his attention only "this morning for the first time;" but then he asserted with great confidence that he knew for a fact that it was not in the White House library. This begs the question of how and when he acquired this detailed knowledge. Did he check with the White House librarian on September 20, at the same time while he was testifying?

He then goes on to tell us that the journal "began in 1994, with a circulation of 400 people". Again, one wonders how he acquired this detailed information with such amazing speed, having only heard of the journal on the same morning. Incidentally, his data are incorrect as pointed out in testimony by Dr. Setlow. The Journal of the Franklin Institute is, in fact, one of the oldest scientific journals in the United States.

EPA Numbers on Costs and Benefits need Checking

EPA Assistant Administrator Mary Nichols testified, with a straight face, that the benefits of CFC phase-out range up to $32 trillion! No backup report was provided. She also gave a benefit-to-cost ratio of 700!

From this data I calculate a cost of over $45 billion. Somehow this does not square with the cost figures which she presented in the same testimony.