英语听力文摘 English Digest 398、人工臭氧可行吗？（在线收听）

Making New Ozone
构建新的臭氧层

Don: Yaël,We’re always hearing that the ozone layer is being depleted, and how bad this is because we need it to protect us from the sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays.

But I’ve been thinking, and there has to be a more effective way to restore the ozone layer than just by sitting around not releasing any more harmful chemicals into the air so the ozone has a chance to repair itself.

Yaël: Ok, like what?

D: Well, how hard could it be to make more ozone? We must have plenty of raw materials.

After all the ozone molecule contains three oxygen atoms–and the oxygen molecules we breathe contain two oxygen atoms, so can we just use that oxygen to produce a bunch of ozone ourselves and stick it back up in the atmosphere?

D: Why not?

Y:Several reasons prevent us from doing this. For one thing, ozone in large quantities is extremely hazardous and volatile, which makes it hard to work with, to say the least. Also, the ozone layer is immense–there’s roughly twenty billion tons of it–and we’d have no way of handling such large quantities.

Plus, the ozone layer requires a huge amount of energy to maintain itself, which right now it gets from the sun. Taking over natural ozone production would require more than double the energy the United States produces annually.

That would cause an enormous amount of blackouts.

And that’s why the only way we know to fight ozone depletion is by cleaning up our act and giving nature the chance to take its course.

Don: 我们常常听到臭氧层正在逐渐消失的消息，这可不是件好事。因为臭氧层保护我们人类免受太阳过量的紫外线侵害。

但是，我一直在考虑，比起不再释放任何有害化学物质到空气中静观其变而言，我们可以采取有效措施修复破坏的臭氧层。

Yaël: 有何高见？

D:我们不要不少原材料，人工合成更多的臭氧层应该不难吧？

毕竟，所有的臭氧分子由三个氧原子组成；我们呼吸的氧分子包含两个氧原子。这样，我们可以自己用氧气制造臭氧，以此替代破坏的臭氧层圈。

Y:没门。

D:没门？

Y:没错，我们无法生产臭氧来取代臭氧层空洞。

D:为什么不行？

这有可能会引发灯火管制。

这就是我们保护臭氧层消失的唯一可行办法是从我们自己做起，爱护环境，顺其自然。

let nature take its own course：顺其自然

blackouts:灯火管制