For a brief time, it looked like the aerosol ban would be the first step toward a comprehensive worldwide CFC phase-out. Efforts were stalled in the 1980s, however, with the stridently anti-environmental Ronald Reagan in the White House and new, industry-friendly decision-makers in charge at EPA and elsewhere in Washington. Instead, it was an event occurring thousands of miles from Washington, in one of the most obscure places on earth, that finally drove home the urgency of the issue.
Policymakers hesitate to make policy based on scientific theories, and scientists, who traditionally proceed cautiously over many years, hesitate to arrive speedily at concrete proof. INDUSTRY, though less visibly hostile to environmental concerns these days, is still perfectly willing to exploit differences within the scientific community in order to avoid the need for regulatory reform. A further complication is that developing nations such as India and China resent having to rein in growth when most of the pollution related to climate change is caused by prior and ongoing excess in the industrialized nations.
Thanks to the resolution of the CFC problem, however, the global framework for phaseout agreements and other negotiations is now in place. The 13 years it took (1974-1987) for the world to agree to shut down a major industry providing a highly useful substance might even be viewed, given the normal pace of international diplomacy, as breathtakingly fast. Environmentalists, scientists, policymakers, and industry can work together to safeguard the global environment and public health. But experts are not optimistic about a quick fix for global warming. Many fear another Antarctic ozone hole-like catastrophe will be necessary to spur action. Or that it already may be too late.
