When chemists Sherwood Rowland and Mario Molina first postulated a link between chlorofluorocarbons and ozone layer depletion in 1974, the news was greeted with scepticism, but taken seriously nonetheless. The vast majority of credible scientists have since confirmed this hypothesis.

The ozone layer around the Earth shields us all from harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun. Without the ozone layer, life on earth would not exist. Exposure to increased levels of ultraviolet radiation can cause cataracts, skin cancer, and immune system suppression in humans as well as innumerable effects on other living systems. This is why Rowland's and Molina's theory was taken so seriously, so quickly - the stakes are literally the continuation of life on earth.

One of the most pressing questions before the scientific community was how bad will it get, and how fast will it happen? In an attempt to answer this, various different models - all much more complex than any previous attempts - were developed. From 1974 to 1983 these models predicted anywhere from 19% ozone depletion (50 years down the line) to a loss of only 3% of the ozone shield [Benedick, Richard, Ozone Diplomacy, Harvard University Press, 1991, p.13]]. None of these models predicted the appearance of the Antarctic ozone hole, which was first reported by British scientists in 1985.

Although the forces behind its annual creation are more fully understood now, the hole's initial detection came as quite a shock in 1985. Scientists had already acknowledged ozone depletion as a real threat, but it was generally assumed that it would come on gradually. This complacency generated policies to gradually phase out global use of ozone depleting chemicals. The emergence of the ozone hole proved that our understanding of atmospheric science is less than perfect - yet the policies remained generally unchanged. More importantly though, the appearance of the hole showed that changes could be non-linear, and sudden. This fact should be placed firmly in the minds of negotiators at the Protocol as they set policy under a gradually thinning global ozone layer.

The unexpected, and at the time, unexplained, appearance of the hole is the best argument possible for the need for the precautionary principle to govern environmental policy. Briefly stated, the precautionary principle suggests that policy makers accept the notion that our scientific understanding of our ecosystem is incomplete, and prescribes policies which take this into account by seeking to avoid environmental harm. Perceived short-term economic costs should be viewed as secondary, given the enormous potential costs associated with environmental disaster - in this case, widespread ozone depletion.

The Montreal Protocol is not an example of the precautionary principle at work. Rather, the Protocol continues to be based on a premise of environmental management, or a balancing of economics and ecology based on best available science. This is the fatal flaw in the Protocol. Negotiators at the Protocol, armed with the latest (but always imperfect) scientific data, manage the ozone layer at the margins. While it may be possible to phase out chemicals faster and more completely, such steps are often deemed too expensive. These decisions are justified on the basis of science, which may, or as in the case of the appearance of the hole, may not be correct. As a later section in this report shows, even that science concedes that a certain level of impacts will come to pass.

This environmental management practice is called risk-assessment. In short, this risk assessment attempts to weigh the economic costs of banning ozone depleting chemicals outright vs. the human and environmental "costs" (deaths, cancers, extinctions) of additional damage to the ozone layer. When negotiators in Vienna in late 1995 decide whether or not to ban all CFCs immediately or by 2010, they are deciding whether or not an additional amount of ultraviolet radiation will be allowed to strike the Earth, and whether or not an additional number of deaths from skin cancer are acceptable costs of perceived economic needs. The stakes involved in these discussions are quite literally life and death. Risk assessment has been widely criticized for giving governments the power to decide how many deaths are acceptable, how many illnesses are bearable, how many extinctions are manageable. The major reason that the Protocol incorporates this philosophy is the pervasive influence of the chemical industry at all levels of the Protocol. It is often assumed that the appearance of the Antarctic ozone hole was the impetus behind the crafting of the Protocol in 1987. In fact, Antarctica was never discussed at the negotiations. Rather, it was industry's late endorsement of the Protocol (led by Du Pont) that paved the way for the global agreement. Corporate capitulation on their stance that CFC substitutes were still years away provided a framework of possibility for governments to point to in crafting the Protocol.

This industry defined framework is the foundation of the Protocol today. At every level of the Protocol, industry representatives exert a tremendous influence. For instance, the World Bank, which is responsible for the majority of the funds given by the North to help the South phase out of ozone depleting substances, relies heavily on chemical industry experts for technical expertise. As a result, decisions regarding alternatives to CFCs have been skewed towards other environmentally damaging technologies, although pressure from environmental groups has begun to change this in the last year.

More subtly, while industry representatives sing the praises of the Protocol and its processes, they have been hard at work in developing countries to ensure their market share - sometimes of the very chemicals they have agreed to phase out. As an industrial trade agreement, meant to ensure markets for Northern chemical companies, the Protocol has indeed been a success. The language of the Protocol guarantees that Northern chemical companies will be allowed to continue producing CFCs for at least 10 more years. In addition, as the markets for CFCs shrink around the world, chemical company alternatives (e.g. HCFCs and HFCs) are being entrenched despite the fact that other, more environmentally friendly, and more economic options exist. If one understands the objective of the Protocol as phasing out consumption of CFCs in the North, then, to some extent, it can be viewed as a success. However, this narrow interpretation is skewed. The health of the ozone layer, and the global use of ozone depleting substances, is the issue. The Protocol sanctions continued use of ozone depleting substances, funds the adoption of new ozone depleting technologies, and creates new environmental problems. Good for industry, maybe. Good for the environment? Certainly not.