CFC gas smuggled into India poses threat to ozone layer
Tons of gases that eat away the Earth's ozone layer are smuggled into India and other developing nations each year in an illegal trade that threatens a landmark treaty to phase out the harmful chemicals by the end of the decade, environmentalists say.
The gases, mainly chlorofluorocarbons, (CFCs) are used in air conditioning and refrigerators. According to Environmentalists, continued use, could undo efforts to replenish the ozone layer under the 1987 Montreal Protocol.
The treaty, ratified by more than 170 countries, requires that the most harmful ozone-depleting gases, such as CFCs, be phased out from production and use in developing countries by 2010. Industrialized nations already stopped using them in 1996, but companies are still allowed to produce a limited quantity for medicinal use and for supplying the basic needs of developing nations.
Under the Montreal treaty, developing countries receive hundreds of millions of dollars in World Bank funds to phase out CFC use. This would allow the hole in the ozone layer over the South Pole - currently estimated at 9.6 million square miles - to gradually repair itself, experts believe.
The hole allows large amounts of harmful ultraviolet radiation to reach the Earth's surface, increasing the incidence of skin cancer and eye cataracts, reducing farm yields, and harming fish stocks.
CFC smuggling in India is "just the tip of the iceberg." In fact it occurs throughout the Middle East and in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and other Asian countries.
Industrialized nations have updated their cooling equipment, leaving poorer, developing nations as the main buyers in the parallel market.
Indian gas producers say the problem is worsened because they haven't been able to acquire Western-developed technology for making cleaner gases, which would lower the cost some. U.S. and European companies want to preserve their control over the market, said S.C. Wadhwa, vice president of Gujarat Flurochemicals, one of India's four main CFC manufacturers. The Indian Institute for Chemical Technology in Hyderabad has been trying to develop a process for making cleaner gas since the mid-1990s but still isn't ready even for pilot tests, Wadhwa said.
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