Climate change to increase UV exposure at high latitudes
By Marlowe Hood and Richard Ingham (AFP) PARIS — Climate change will disrupt Earth’s precious ozone layer, boosting ultraviolet (UV) radiation in the deep southern hemisphere and reducing UV in far northern latitudes, a study warned on Sunday. By century’s end, UV levels in Antarctica could rise by up to 20 percent at seasonal peaks while average exposure in northern Scandinavia, Siberia and northern Canada could fall by almost a tenth. The shift could have worrying impacts on human health, as high exposure to UV is linked to cancer, cataracts and crop damage just as low exposure causes vitamin D insufficiency. “Our study is showing that there is a new threat to the ozone layer, and this is climate change, which will either increase or decrease UV depending on the region,” said atmospheric physicist Michaela Hegglin of Canada’s University of Toronto. “And while too much UV exposure is known to be a bad thing, too little UV exposure can also have detrimental effects, though these are much less explored.” … The new study, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, points to an unforeseen peril — not from depletion but from the way the ozone layer is distributed by high-altitude winds. …
