Well, not quite. But the juxtaposition of two stories on ozone makes a point I’ve made before: Whenever we mess something up and then try to fix our mess, we almost always mess up something else. Anyway, this is a story of partially good news vs. partially bad news. You want the partially good news first?
NASA and NOAA reported in October, 2019, that the ozone hole was the smallest such “hole” (actually, a lessening of O3) since 1982. That’s only partially good news because the increase in ozone appears to be related to warmer stratospheric temperatures, and not to human efforts. In raising Earth's temperature (a supposedly bad thing), we seem to have decreased the ozone hole. Nevertheless, since ozone protects us from UV rays, let’s take the news as mostly positive.*
Juxtaposed against this “partially good news” is a story of partially bad news about China’s air pollution. Ozone, which is good for us when it lies in the stratosphere, isn’t good for us when it lies in the troposphere. You don’t want to breathe the stuff if you can avoid it. And it so happens that as China attempts to reduce its fine particulate matter pollution, it’s increasing its ozone pollution.**
Try to do one thing, and you end up with another. There always seems to be that unintended consequence or some unintended actor. The very thing that we must supposedly guard against, that is, a rise in temperature, appears to be the primary actor in the diminution of stratospheric ozone. And the attempt to reduce harmful particulates seems to have generated a mechanism for increasing surface ozone.
I am tempted to say…Oh! What the heck! I’m going to say it: What we anticipate is rarely a problem.
The problem lies in our inability to anticipate all the consequences of our actions. But what choice to we have? Rather than simply tossing purpose to the winds of chance, we’re probably better off when we act purposely, and that seems to work for us individually and socially. Will we ever avoid bad consequences? No. But we will probably get some “partially good news” more often than we will hear wholly bad news. Messing up is human, but so is recovering.
* https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145747/2019-ozone-hole-is-the-smallest-on-record and https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/2019-ozone-hole-is-the-smallest-on-record-since-its-discovery
** https://www.caixinglobal.com/2019-08-22/ozone-pollution-is-becoming-a-bigger-threat-to-chinas-air-101453900.html