Experts on Monday urged to replace harmful Hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) gas by Isobutane (R-600a) in manufacturing air conditioners (AC) and refrigerators as it has low global warming potential comparing to HFC, reports UNB.
Bangladesh as well as many other countries of the world are contributing to the global warming, ozone layer degrading and environmental pollution through the increased use of HFC gas, a global warming potential (GWP) gas that have high prospective for climate degradation and global warming, they said.
The climate specialists came up with the observations while addressing a stakeholders' orientation workshop on 'Ratification of Kigali Amendment' organised by Bangladesh centre for Advanced Studies (BCAS) and Christain Aid at a city hotel.
HFC now commonly used in air conditioning and as refrigerants in place of the older chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) and it does not harm the ozone layer as much as the CFC; however, it does contribute to global warming.
Whereas, Isobutane has negligible ozone depletion potential and very low global warming potential and can serve as a functional replacement for CFC and HFC refrigerants in conventional stationary refrigeration and air conditioning systems.
Presenting a research paper on 'Current Status of HFC Phase down in Bangladesh: Barriers and Challenges" Dr. Monirul Islam Sharif, Senior Fellow of BCAS, said the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, brought in October 2016, recommended to use the R600a (Isobutane) gas for manufacturing AC and refrigerators as it has very minimal consequence on the environment.
The Kigali Amendment, global climate deal was agreed at Kigali Conference- 2016, at the capital of Rwanda, in 28th meeting of the parties to the Montreal Protocol, where negotiators from 197 nations signed the agreement to amend the Montreal Protocol.
Through the agreement the members promised to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases including HFCs.
It would bring down 80-85 per cent use of HFC gas by 2045 and prevent up to 0.5 degrees Celsius of global warming by year 2100.
The targets of the amendment will come into force from January 01, 2019.
Dr Sharif said some manufacturers in the country started using the R600a gas in their production from 2017 but still large numbers of the heavy industries are out of the sphere.
Executive Director of BCAS, Dr A Atiq Rahman, said Bangladesh should immediately bring the Kigali Amendment policies into its legislation which would pressurise the industries to stop using harmful gases in their production as well as stop importing these gases and encourage using comparatively safer gases for the environments, he added.
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