AEI air quality expert Joel Schwartz comments on “another authoritative-but-wrong paper in a premier scientific journal that will henceforth be used to support unwarranted alarmism about climate change and air pollution.”
Schwartz sums up the problems with the recent study on ground-level ozone pretty well below. Note once again that prosperity appears to be the key to a healthy environment:
Unfortunately, comparison of Sitch et al.’s model results with actual trends in ozone and ozone-forming pollutants show that their study has nothing to do with reality.
Sitch et al. conclude ozone will rise all over the world during the 21st Century. In reality, ozone levels have been dropping for decades in wealthy countries and will continue to do so. And while ozone will probably rise for a few decades in developing countries, these countries will reduce their ozone levels as they become wealthy enough to afford the necessary pollution controls—exactly as has already happened in the U.S. and Europe.