Why A New EPA Rule Is Not Enough To Phase Out Climate-Harming Refrigerants
The Biden administration’s first major climate rule is set to transform how we keep people and products cool in a warming climate by cutting some of the most damaging and potent greenhouse gases (GHG) in the world.
On Sept. 23, the Environmental Protection Agency established a new rule to reduce the use and production of hydrofluorocarbons (HFC) by 85% over the next 15 years. These compounds are used in a wide variety of refrigerators and air conditioning appliances in the residential and commercial sectors nationwide.
While the rule is a welcome and necessary step in preventing further warming, the phase-out timeline still leaves an open window for HFCs to continue to be used and produced in the years ahead when we are facing an urgent need to rapidly accelerate our climate ambition to reach the goals of the Paris Agreement.
The reason HFCs are a major climate concern is due to their high global warming potential (GWP). GWP is a measure of how much energy 1 ton of a gas, once emitted into the atmosphere, will absorb radiation over a given period of time, relative to the emissions of 1 ton of carbon dioxide.
HFCs, when released into the atmosphere, have GWPs between 2,000 and 4,000.
HFCs enter the atmosphere through the production, use and disposal of a multitude of appliances and applications vital to modern life. These include the refrigeration units keeping our food and medicine safe and the air conditioning units we need to keep buildings habitable. According to the EPA, depending on their design and use, food refrigeration appliances leak 20-80% of their initial “charge” of HFC refrigerant across their lifetime.
The irony is, as climate change worsens and we experience warmer temperatures, the more we will rely on these kinds of appliances. We’ve seen recently how dangerous a warming world can be in the recent heatwaves across the Pacific Northwest and Canada.
The good news is refrigerants with much lower GWP exist – some representing more than a 1,000% reduction from what is typically used in refrigerated appliances currently. California, Washing
And so, the new EPA rule is a big step in the right direction. It is estimated to cut nearly the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions as three years’ worth of pollution from the U.S. power sector by 2050.
However, while regulation will certainly begin a shift to lower-emitting alternatives, on its own, it won’t require or spur the rapid transition to ultra-low GWP (i.e., < 15) alternative refrigerants we truly need. Long-lived
How, then, can we drive the use of the available, but currently more expensive, existing alternatives? The carbon market might just be the answer.
The ability to generate carbon credits can incentivize manufacturers to quickly start producing appliances that utilize ultra-low GWP refrigerants, support current producers of these refrigerants, and reduce costs for industries that use this equipment to procure sustainable options long before they would be required to do so by regulation, or the natural end-of-life of existing products.
By providing financial incentives to manufacturers to rapidly transition to ultra-low GWP refrigerants, carbon credits
This also provides an opportunity for leadership on the global stage and create a competitive advantage for U.S. manufacturing. With support from the carbon market, U.S. industry could quickly become a leader in the use, manufacture and export of low GWP appliances and continue to urge nations like India and China to follow this trend.
Carbon markets have the potential to catalyze a big change by massively reducing the climate impact of the refrigerants we all rely on by factors of a hundred or a thousand and doing so much quicker than the new EPA regulation can on its own. We should utilize their power wisely to set the world on a "cooler" path tapping into technological innovations and sustainable practices for climate action today.
Margaret Williams is Director of Industrial Programs at American Carbon Registry
© Copyright IBTimes 2024. All rights reserved.