Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Is it true that lightning helps to heal and thicken the ozone layer?

The energy from a lightning strike can produce ozone (O3) from atmospheric oxygen (O2). However, the ozone layer is produced by ultraviolet radiation from the sun; it breaks oxygen molecules apart, and the free oxygen atoms recombine with O2 molecules to form O3. Lightning strikes not only produce far less ozone than sunlight, the ozone they produce is too low in the atmosphere to reach the stratospheric ozone layer. Human activity can create large amounts of ozone, since man-made pollutants also react with atmospheric oxygen to form ozone (see link).

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