Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
and agrees on the political procedures of a framework convention designed
to accomplish these goals. The framework convention typically yields a
treaty (the 1985 Vienna Convention) enforced through negotiated proto-
cols (most notably the Montreal Protocol) that describe the more specific
actions that individual nations must take to accommodate the treaty as
the problem changes over time. Third, national-level political campaigns
secure the convention's ratification by national governments, which then
collectively codify the treaty under the rules of the United Nations. And
finally, once in force, the protocols are implemented, monitored, and
strengthened depending on their success over time.
18
As Speth writes,
“The Montreal protocol is the crowning achievement of global environ-
mental governance.”
19
Indeed, it has succeeded remarkably in stemming
the tide of stratospheric ozone depletion since it entered into force.
20
The Montreal Protocol has served less admirably, however, as a model
for international action on climate change. Unlike the buildup of CO
2
,
ozone depletion had a direct, tangible impact on human health— increases
in the risk of skin cancer— that struck a chord with an environmental com-
munity already deeply engaged with the fight against cancer and keen on
reducing environmental carcinogens.
21
The National Academy of Sciences
estimated that the continued use of CFCs at 1974 rates could lead to a
14 percent reduction in stratospheric ozone. And in a world of reduced
ozone, the NAS wrote, “all unshielded cells are highly vulnerable to sun-
light and may be killed by relatively short exposure to full sunlight.”
22
As
Global 2000
pointed out, a mere 10 percent reduction in stratospheric ozone
“appears likely to lead to a 20- 30 percent increase” in skin cancer.
23
“Ozone
induced changes in UV radiation,”
Global 2000
noted, “would change one
of the conditions that has almost certainly influenced the evolution of life
on earth so far, and . . . can be expected to precipitate a disturbance in the
existing balance of life virtually everywhere on the planet.”
24
Whereas
climate change remained somewhere between a legitimate environmen-
tal concern and a scientific curiosity, environmentalists could treat ozone
depletion as an environmental emergency.
Also unlike threats to the stability of the earth's climate, artificial
threats to stratospheric ozone came from discrete and easily identifiable
sources, mostly in the form of nonessential or replaceable consumer prod-
ucts like aerosol cans, Styrofoam, and certain refrigerants. Atmospheric
CO
2
, by contrast, came from fossil fuels burned around the world for
