The UN believes that the Earth’s ozone layer is on track to recover within four decades, due to success of Montreal Protocol.

In a report published every four years on the progress of the Montreal Protocol, the panel confirmed the phase-out of nearly 99 per cent of banned ozone-depleting substances, and according to the panel’s report, if current policies remain in place, the layer is expected to recover to 1980 values by 2040.

The Montreal Protocol was signed in September 1987 and is a landmark multilateral environmental agreement that regulates the consumption and production of nearly 100 man-made chemicals, or ‘ozone-depleting substances’. In 2016 an additional agreement to the Montreal Protocol, known as the Kigali Amendment required a phase-down of the production and consumption of some hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs).

The Montreal Protocol has already benefitted efforts to mitigate climate change, helping avoid global warming by an estimated 0.5C, and the Kigali Amendment is estimated to avoid another 0.3–0.5C of warming by 2100.

The discovery of a hole in the Ozone Layer was first announced by three scientists from the British Antarctic Survey, in May 1985.

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