Kyoto projects harm ozone layer: U.N. official

Kyoto projects harm ozone layer: U.N. official

Mon Aug 13, 2007 9:07am EDT

By Gerard Wynn

LONDON (Reuters) - The biggest emissions-cutting projects under the

Kyoto Protocol on global warming have directly contributed to an

increase in the production of gases that destroy the ozone layer, a

senior U.N. official says.

In addition, evidence suggests that the same projects, in developing

countries, have deliberately raised their emissions of greenhouse

gases only to destroy these and therefore claim more carbon credits,

said Stanford University's Michael Wara.

Kyoto is meant to curb emissions of the greenhouse gases blamed for

global warming, but is undermining a separate pact called the Montreal

Protocol, meant to phase out gases which harm the earth's ozone layer.

That layer in the atmosphere shields the planet from damaging

ultra-violet rays that can cause skin cancer.

At the heart of the clash is a carbon trading scheme under Kyoto,

worth $5 billion last year, whereby rich countries pay poorer ones to

cut greenhouse gas emissions on their behalf, called the clean

development mechanism (CDM).

The most popular type of project has been to destroy a potent

greenhouse gas known as HFC 23, one of a family of so-called

hydrofluorocarbons, in China and India.

The problem is that HFC 23 is a waste product in the manufacture of a

refrigerant gas which damages the ozone layer, called HCFC 22, and

chemical plants have used their CDM profits to ramp up production.

"This is certainly one of the major drivers now in the increase in

production of HCFC 22," Rajendra Shende, director of ozone issues at

the United Nations Environment Programme, which administers the

Montreal Protocol, said on Monday.

HCFC 22 now risked undoing recent repair to the ozone layer, Shende

said in an interview.

Chemical plants have used CDM profits to cut the sale price of HCFC

22, pricing out alternatives that don't deplete ozone such as carbon

dioxide and ammonia.

"(U.N.) bodies need to work more together, to see the actions of one

don't risk the actions of another," Shende said.

Governments signed up to the Montreal Protocol will likely vote next

month to accelerate the complete phase out of HCFC 22 in developing

countries by 2025 or 2030 from 2040 now, he said.

LUCRATIVE

CDM projects which destroy HFC 23 are especially lucrative because the

gas is 12,000 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide

(CO2), although its overall contribution to climate change is far less

because CO2 is much more common.

As a result, destroying HFC 23 spawns far more money-spinning carbon

credits than any other way of curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

Carbon trading isn't the only reason why HCFC 22 production is up,

said Shende. A fund raised under the Montreal Protocol has paid makers

of air conditioners and fridges to use HCFC 22 instead of more

dangerous ozone-depleting gases, CFCs.

In addition, increasingly affluent classes in developing countries are

now better able to afford air conditioners.

HOT AIR

The environmental credentials of HFC 23 projects are further

undermined by evidence that chemical plants in China have deliberately

"tuned" their factories to produce more of what should be a waste

product, to make more money under CDM.

Chemical plants participating in CDM make twice as much HFC 23 as a

proportion of the actual end product refrigerant than those in rich

countries which can't participate in the scheme, said Michael Wara,

research fellow at Stanford University.

"It doubles the flow of carbon credits, but there are real questions

whether it's hot air," Wara said. The carbon credits are being used as

carbon offsets to allow companies to continue to produce greenhouse

gases in Europe.

"They've tuned the plants to double the amount of HFC 23 you would

normally produce, for example in Europe or the United States. All CDM

participant plants came in at 3 percent (HFC 23 versus HCFC 22), the

Kyoto Protocol maximum, versus 1.5 percent in countries that can't

participate in the scheme."

--

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to

escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. -- Marcus Aurelius

Wherever I go it will be well with me, for it was well with me here, not

on account of the place, but of my judgments which I shall carry away

with me, for no one can deprive me of these; on the contrary, they alone

are my property, and cannot be taken away, and to possess them suffices

me wherever I am or whatever I do. -- EPICTETUS

Joseph R. Darancette

daranc@NOSPAMcharter.net