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The importance of finding the path forward to climate-safe refrigeration and air conditioning: thinking outside the box and without limits

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Abstract

Recently, an influential segment of the refrigeration and air conditioning engineering community has been making the provocative case that (1) every refrigerant is already identified, (2) none of the identified refrigerants satisfy the environmental criteria for stratospheric ozone and climate protection, and (3) every selection of refrigerant represents a trade-off in either safety, economy, ozone depletion, greenhouse gas emissions, and/or energy efficiency. The hypothesis is that science is at a dead end and that it will be necessary to compromise safety, climate, or cost. In some cases, the hypothesis suggests that society can only hope to trade one environmental problem for another. This essay disputes the hypothesis that all refrigerants have been identified and makes the case that chemists and engineers will continue to innovate in refrigerant design and application. It takes a fresh look at the evolution of refrigeration and air conditioning, makes the case that chemists are continuing to innovate in refrigerant design, and explores how engineers are just beginning to innovate in the integration of refrigerants and application technology. It describes the engineering solutions that make flammable and toxic refrigerants safe to use; new technologies on the verge of outperforming historic refrigerant cooling; integrated heating and cooling functions that save the climate and money; district cooling solutions coming into the marketplace; and new architectural and city planning strategies that can bypass the dependence on air conditioning with a goal of carbon-neutral or even carbon-sequestering living and work spaces. In conclusion, this essay recommends that governments redouble their efforts to support the commercialization of new refrigerants and not-in-kind alternatives to refrigeration and air conditioning and that stakeholders organize a “pathfinder” exercise to find the way forward.

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Notes

  1. See also exhaustive work of James Calm and his colleagues using a meticulous screening process to select refrigerants (Calm 2012 and Calm and Hourahan 2011). Of course, there is a respectable academic literature that properly tries to quantify the rate of technical progress, and part of the literature is devoted to the phenomenon that industry often tries to avoid regulation by exaggerating the consequences to employment, competitiveness, and product prices while environmental authorities try to enact regulation by exaggerating the ease and social benefits of compliance. Cowen (2014) makes the argument "the low hanging fruit has already picked and Russell Stannard (2010) claims that the quest for new knowledge in science is reaching its limits. See: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/8020211/Is-the-age-of-scientific-discovery-ending.html.

  2. This paper presents the latest estimates of GWP from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) Fifth Assessment Report (AR5).

  3. The replacement CFC-11 (ODP = 1; GWP100-yr = 4660) in building air conditioning chillers with HCFC-123 (ODP = 0.01GWP100-yr = 79) is significantly better for ozone and climate from refrigerant emissions and achieves higher energy efficiency. However, the replacement of HCFC-22 (ODP = 0.05; GWP100-yr = 1760) with HFC-410a (ODP = 0; GWP100-yr = 1923) is better for ozone, but worse in both refrigerant emissions and energy efficiency for climate.

  4. When the Montreal Protocol was signed in 1987, the only controlled substances were CFCs (used primarily as aerosol propellents, refrigerants, solvents, and foam blowing agents) and halons uses in fire protection. HCFCs, which were not controlled by the 1987 Montreal Protocol were already used as refrigerants and were considered as “transitional substances” in CFC applications where ozone-safe technology was not yet available. Subsequently, scientific assessments determined that stratospheric ozone protection required the phase-out of HCFCs and a long list of other ODSs. Thus, the HCFC phaseout began for non-Article 5 (developed) Parties with a freeze in 1996 and with a current phase-out date of 2030.For Article 5 Parties, the HCFC phase-out began with a freeze in 2013 and a current phase-out date of 2040.

  5. The predicted percentage of total basin flows from glacial melt is: Amu Daray (10-20 %), Brahmaputra: 12.3 %, Ganges: 9.1 %, Irrawaddy: <1 %, Indus: 44.8 %, Mekong: 6.6 %, Salween: 8.8 %, Tarim: 40.2 %, Yangtze: 18.5 %, and Yellow: 1.3 %9 (UNEP 2012).

  6. The Kyoto Protocol also accounts for the benefits of HFC containment because it controls emissions (not production and consumption) and has embraced carbon trading that allows the offset of climate forcing of HFCs.

  7. Article 1, Paragraph 5: Production means the amount of controlled substances produced, minus the amount destroyed by technologies to be approved by the Parties and minus the amount entirely used as feedstock in the manufacture of other chemicals. The amount recycled and reused is not to be considered as “production.”

  8. The calculation of the amount of an ODS destroyed necessary to offset the new manufacture of another ODS could assure that both the short-term and long-term ozone depletion were less than if the trade had not occurred. Solomon and Albritton (1992) put forward the scientific basis for these calculations to help policy makers understand that HCFCs with lower ODP could have a larger short-term impact on stratospheric ozone than the higher ODP CFCs they replaced. The Solomon/ Albritton approach also allowed the calculation of the immediate ozone recovery benefits of rapid phaseout of low-ODP methyl chloroform. The same sort of clear calculations are also necessary in calculating how much carbon offsets a particular HFC greenhouse gas.

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  1. Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development, 2300 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W., Suite 300B, Washington, DC, 20007, USA

    Stephen O. Andersen & Nancy J. Sherman

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  1. Stephen O. Andersen
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  2. Nancy J. Sherman
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Correspondence to Nancy J. Sherman.

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Andersen, S.O., Sherman, N.J. The importance of finding the path forward to climate-safe refrigeration and air conditioning: thinking outside the box and without limits. J Environ Stud Sci 5, 176–186 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13412-015-0230-3

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