Up in the Air

By Bill Polits

Efforts are afoot to amend the Montreal Protocol to limit the production of hydrofluorocarbons, which include the common clean agent fire suppresants HFC-227ea & HFC-236fa (or as the DuPont products are known - FM-200 & FE-36). Also known as HFCs, these extinguishing agents have a high global warming potential and are subject to regulation under pending US legislation.

In 1989, the Montreal Protocol was ratified, under which nations have curtailed the production of substances which damage the ozone layer. The world community was justifiably proud at this unprecedented level of unanimous and effective international cooperation.

Now, in hopes that the structure and success of the parties to the Montreal Protocol will lend aid to the effort to limit our planet's load of greenhouse gases, two proposals are before the Ozone Secretariat of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) - one from the Federated States of Micronesia and one from Canada, Mexico and the United States.

The limits discussed are aggressive, with Micronesian proposal calling for a reduction by 2030 to 10% of a baseline of the annual average calculated for the years 2004 - 2006 and a near-term goal of 55% of this baseline by 2019.

The proposals will be discussed at the UNEP Ozone Secretariat Open-Ended Working Group June and could be up for approval at the 22nd meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol in November.

See the video, below, for more on international efforts to protect the ozone.