Have you ever wondered why the sky is blue?! Let’s discover five outstanding Ozone Layer facts for kids.
Ozone is a gas made up of three Oxygen molecules, unlike oxygen in the air, ozone has a colour. It appears as a pale blue colour. When it is in a liquid ozone is a very dark blue colour. Unlike oxygen in the air which doesn’t smell of anything Ozone smells unpleasant, it is described as smelling like chlorine, the chemical used to clean swimming pools.
Have you ever escaped the rain by using an umbrella? Or escaped the heat of the sun under a tree’s shade? The Ozone Layer protects the earth from UV rays just like the protection of an umbrella or the shade of a tree. It is an invisible layer in the atmosphere which can absorb 98% of the UV rays of the sun.
UV rays from the sun can damage our eyes and skin, they are the reason we have to wear sunscreen to avoid getting burned on hot summer days.
Global warming is a big problem for the planet but getting warmer isn’t the only problem the Earth could have if we didn’t have the ozone layer. The Ozone layer keeps the earth from being too warm by absorbing heat from the sun and it keeps the earth from too cold by trapping heat from the Earth’s surface.
Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane are produced and released through burning fossil fuels and deforestation of the environment. These gases build up in the atmosphere and trap heat from the sun, increasing the global temperature. This is described as global warming. This increased temperature can cause ice caps to melt and increase the risk of forest fires.
These greenhouse gases can also affect the ozone layer, thinning it or creating a bigger hole in the ozone which reduces how protected we are from the sun.
The largest hole in the Ozone Layer is over Antarctica and scientists believe that it was created in the 1980’s. Because of worldwide action to reduce the use of fossil fuels and the impact of greenhouse gases the hole is recovering. Scientists believe that because of this great progress the hole could return to pre-1980’s levels by 2065 in all polar regions. If we continue to make positive changes we can help the environment.
We hope you enjoyed learning more things about the Ozone Layer as much as we loved teaching you about them. Now that you know how majestic the Ozon Layer is, you can move on to learn about other geography stuff like: Oceans, Rocks, Mountains and Lakes.
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