[Greenbuilding] [BULK] HCFC & HFC ozone & global warming

[George J. Nesbitt]

What I didn't say was that CFC's were going to put out 2 to 3 billion 
pounds of greenhouse gases, and HCFC's and HFC's with put out about the 
same. While there are less of these gases than carbon dioxide, they are 
10 to 11 thousand times worse. The Kyoto Protocol is calling for only 1 
billion pounds reduction in carbon dioxide. That goal has been wiped out 
by using HCFC's and HFC's and we would be lucky to save 1 billion pounds 
of the 2 to 3 by switching to better alternative at this point.

There was another article in todays paper about methane. If the oceans 
heat up too much more methane will be released (worse greenhouse than 
carbon dioxide), and there is more methane in the oceans (12 trillion 
pounds) than carbon dioxide in all of the fossil fuels left on 
earth.Scary thought eh?

We need to dramatically reduce our use of all global warming gases.


Lawrence Lile wrote:

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>George wrote:
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>>Interesting article in the paper recently.
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>In 1989 the Montreal Protocol called for the phase out of CFC's to
>protect the Ozone layer. The problem is we switched mainly to HCFC's and
>HFC's. While they are better for the Ozone layer, they are slightly
>worse when it comes to global warming. 
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>Pound for pound, HCFC's are probably really bad for global warming compared to carbon dioxide.  But I would argue that the global warming potential of HCFC's and HFC's is negligible compared to the carbon dioxide pumped out by a coal power plant, because of the differences in sheer volume.  The HCFC's in your refrigerator, all ten pounds of it, stays in there for many years.  In most applications, at the end of the life of the appliance or air conditioner, most of the HCFC's are recovered by the HVAC technician.  Some escapes through leakage or mistakes, but most never reaches the atmosphere to do harm.  I would suggest we focus on  the bigger contributors to global warming: Cars, Coal, Natural Gas, and so forth.  
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>That being said, I am buying an air conditioner that uses a refrigerant with zero ozone depletion and minimal global warming potential.  
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>--Lawrence Lile
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