Climate
change: global deal reached to limit use of hydrofluorocarbons
Global
deal on HFCs – greenhouse gases far more powerful than carbon
dioxide – seen as ‘largest temperature reduction ever achieved by
single agreement’
Associated Press, in
Rwanda
Saturday 15 October
2016 07.11 BST
A worldwide deal has
been reached to limit the use of greenhouse gases far more powerful
than carbon dioxide in a major effort to fight climate change.
The talks on
hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, have been called the first test of
global will since the historic Paris Agreement to cut carbon
emissions was reached last year. HFCs are described as the world’s
fastest-growing climate pollutant and are used in air conditioners
and refrigerators.
The agreement
announced Saturday morning, after all-night negotiations, caps and
reduces the use of HFCs in a gradual process beginning in 2019 with
action by developed countries including the US, the world’s second
worst polluter. More than 100 developing countries, including China,
the world’s top carbon emitter, will start taking action in 2024.
A small group of
countries including India, Pakistan and some Gulf states pushed for
and secured a later start in 2028, saying their economies need more
time to grow. That is three years earlier than India, the world’s
third worst polluter, had first proposed.
Environmental groups
had hoped the deal could reduce global warming by a half-degree
Celsius by the end of this century. This agreement gets about 90% of
the way there, said Durwood Zaelke, president of the Institute for
Governance and Sustainable Development.
This is the largest
temperature reduction ever achieved by a single agreement.
Zaelke’s group
said this is the “largest temperature reduction ever achieved by a
single agreement”.
The new agreement is
“equal to stopping the entire world’s fossil-fuel CO2 emissions
for more than two years,” David Doniger, climate and clean air
program director with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said in
a statement.
Experts said they
hope market forces will help speed up the limits agreed to in the
deal.
“Compromises had
to be made, but 85% of developing countries have committed to the
early schedule starting 2024, which is a very significant
achievement,” Clare Perry, of the Environmental Investigation
Agency, said.
HFCs were introduced
in the 1980s as a substitute for ozone-depleting gases. But their
danger has grown as air conditioner and refrigerator sales have
soared in emerging economies such as China and India. HFCs are also
found in inhalers and insulating foams.
Major economies have
debated how fast to phase out HFCs. The US, whose delegation was led
by secretary of state John Kerry, and western countries want quick
action. Nations such as India want to give their industries more time
to adjust.
Small island states
and many African countries had pushed for quick action, saying they
face the biggest threat from climate change.
“It may not be
entirely what the islands wanted, but it is a good deal,” the
minister-in-assistance to the president of the Marshall Islands,
Mattlan Zackhras, said. “We all know we must go further, and we
will go further.”
HFCs are less
plentiful than carbon dioxide, but Kerry said last month that they
currently emit as much pollution as 300 coal-fired power plants each
year. That amount will rise significantly over the coming decades as
air conditioning units and refrigerators reach hundreds of millions
of new people.
HFCs do not harm the
ozone layer like chlorofluorocarbons and similar gases that were
eliminated under the 1987 Montreal Protocol. The entire world
ratified that agreement, helping to repair holes in the ozone that
helps shield the planet from the harmful rays of the sun. The aim of
this meeting was to attach an amendment to that treaty dealing
specifically with HFCs.
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