Someone, somewhere, is making a banned chemical that destroys the ozone layer, scientists suspect.

[Cattledog]

Emissions of a banned, ozone-depleting chemical are on the rise, a group of scientists reported Wednesday, suggesting someone may be secretly manufacturing the pollutant in violation of an international accord.

Emissions of CFC-11 have climbed 25 percent since 2012, despite the chemical being part of a group of ozone pollutants that were phased out under the 1987 Montreal Protocol.

“I’ve been making these measurements for more than 30 years, and this is the most surprising thing I’ve seen,” said Stephen Montzka, a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration who led the work. “I was astounded by it, really.”

It’s a distressing result amid what is widely seen as a global environmental success story, in which nations — alarmed by a growing “ozone hole” — collectively took action to phase out chlorofluorocarbons.

The finding seems likely to prompt an international investigation into the mysterious source.

Officially, production of CFC-11 is supposed to be at or near zero — at least, that is what countries have been telling the U.N. body that monitors and enforces the Montreal Protocol. But with emissions on the rise, scientists suspect someone is making the chemical in defiance of the ban.

“Somebody’s cheating,” Durwood Zaelke, founder of the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development and an expert on the Montreal Protocol, said in a comment on the new research. “There’s some slight possibility there’s an unintentional release, but … they make it clear there’s strong evidence this is actually being produced.”

The scientists don’t know exactly who, or where, that person would be. A U.S. observatory in Hawaii found CFC-11 mixed in with other gases that were characteristic of a source coming from somewhere in eastern Asia, but scientists could not narrow the area down any further.

Full article at:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2018/05/16/someone-somewhere-is-making-a-banned-chemical-that-destroys-the-ozone-layer-scientists-suspect/?utm_term=.4d66c2e691cb

[bettyellen]

1. Russia wants global warming- to drill and ship in the Arctic and have more arable land.

They’ve planted their flags north, and are playing a long game. When they can farm their own food, they’ll be economically stable. This will only come with the rest of the world’s suffering- a bonus for them.

[PJMcK]

2. It'll turn out to be China

They cheat on many of their other international agreements.

Their government doesn't care about the health and well-being of their citizens.

They don't care about the environment.

The Chinese want to compete globally and they purposefully tilt the table to their advantage.

[diane in sf]

3. China has no effective rule of law and no doubt unscrupulous busnesses are buying this stuff

[NNadir]

5. And from your ethically and morally superior position, your supposition that they do so for what...

...purpose?

It is equally possible that poor people don't run out and buy new refrigerators every ten years and that very old appliances are failing.

One of the interesting things about bourgeois people is that they love to complain about China.

For example, China is a villain for Americans because it releases as much carbon dioxide as the United States, even though the population of the United States is 1/5th that of China.

Americans have no problem with the fact that 1/10 of the rice crop is contaminated with unsafe levels of cadmium so Americans can have "green" solar cells on their roofs, solar cells that in 20 years will be useless electronic waste to be shipped to China, or the third world country du jour where poor people can "recycle" them so we remain green.

This may come as a surprise, but there are Chinese people who care as much about the world as people in the United States.

I suspect that many of the American bourgeois types who want to lecture the Chinese have not the slightest inkling about human poverty or care very much about it. This is not to say that poor people are manufacturing or dumping CFC's or even that there is any real use for these gases any more. They can be, and sometimes are under uncontrolled and monitored conditions side products of the semiconductor industry, particularly in ionization conditions.

More typical is the release of perfluoroalkanes, in particular the potent greenhouse gas CF4, a side product of the solar cell (and other semiconductor) industries that our mindless people in this country have declared "green," because they neither understand or care about technological issues. However, it is quite possible to imagine free radical decomposition reactions, particularly with the powerful carcinogen trichlorosilane used to purify silicon for solar cells, that CFC's can be generated.

But of course, we here, we live under "the rule of law." Our Congress and our so called "President" are paragons of our superiority.

Really?

The average continuous per capita power consumption of a citizen of China is about 900-1000 watts. The average per capita continous power consumption of an American is 12,000 watts.

Tell me all over again, about the "rule of law." What law are you talking about? "Moral law?" "The laws of ethics?" "The laws of basic human decency?"

I have no idea whatsoever what you imagine what the "rule of law" might be, but 99% of the time, I find people in this country lecturing other people about environmental decency have a very limited understanding or no understanding whatsoever about either moral law or the laws of science.

Have a nice "green" solar powered day tomorrow.

[hunter]

4. The strange thing is that for most uses there are less expensive alternatives.

The only reason these chemicals became so common is that they were pushed hard by U.S. manufacturers as the best thing since apple pie.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_F._Kettering

Yep, the same guy who gave us leaded gasoline.