Archive for August 8th, 2012

The Law of Unintended Consequences.

Wednesday, August 8th, 2012

HFC-22 is a common coolant used in things that require cooling, like air conditioners and refrigerators.

The process of producing HFC-22 yields another gas, HFC-23, as a waste product.

The United Nations has a system that rates gases based on their atmospheric effects.

As the United Nations became involved in efforts to curb climate change in the last 20 years, it relied on a scientific formula: Carbon dioxide, the most prevalent warming gas, released by smokestacks and vehicles, is given a value of 1. Other industrial gases are assigned values relative to that, based on their warming effect and how long they linger. Methane is valued at 21, nitrous oxide at 310. HFC-23, the waste gas produced making the world’s most common coolant — which is known as HFC-22 — is near the top of the list, at 11,700.

The result? Companies that produce HFC-22 are making it like it is going out of style, so they can produce HFC-23 as a waste product. Then they destroy the HFC-23 so they can get “waste gas credits”. Then they sell the “waste gas credits” on the open market. Step 4: profit.

The manufacturers have grown accustomed to an income stream that in some years accounted for half their profits. The windfall has enhanced their power and influence. As a result, many environmental experts fear that if manufacturers are not paid to destroy the waste gas, they will simply resume releasing it into the atmosphere.

More:

Carbon trading has become so essential to companies like Gujarat Fluorochemicals Limited, which owns a huge coolant plant in this remote corner of northwest India, that carbon credits are listed as a business on the company Web site. Each plant has probably earned, on average, $20 million to $40 million a year from simply destroying waste gas, says David Hanrahan, the technical director of IDEAcarbon, a leading carbon market consulting firm. He says the income is “largely pure profit.”

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August 8th updates.

Wednesday, August 8th, 2012

Longer Marvin Hamlisch: NYT, LAT.

Speaking of obits, noted astronomer and pioneer of radio telescopy, Sir Bernard Lovell, passed away on Monday.

There was an update to the Sheri Sangji story while I was on vacation that I wasn’t able to blog. Luckily, Derek Lowe was on the case. For those of you who don’t remember the story, Ms. Sangji was working with t-butyl lithium in a UCLA lab; the substance, which catches fire when exposed to air, spilled, Ms. Sangji was severely burned, and died 18 days later. The university and the primary researcher, Dr. Patrick Harran, faced felony charges.

While I was gone, the charges against the university were dropped. Apparently, UCLA made a deal with the prosecution. The charges against Dr. Harran still stand.

But then it gets weird. Dr. Harran’s defense team is trying to discredit the OSHA report on the accident, based on the accusation that the author of the report participated in a murder when he was 16 years old and failed to disclose this to his employers. I’m not sure at this point if it was actually established that the author of the report and the murderer were the same person, but the author resigned his position anyway.

This is intended to be a short update. The Derek Lowe blog entry linked above has a longer summary, including links to various other sources; I commend it to your attention.

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