Back to news
A Restricted Climate Super Pollutant Is Pumped Out at Far Higher Levels Than Countries Admit. What Happens Next?
@Source: insideclimatenews.org
This article was co-reported with Foreign Policy.
A climate super pollutant thousands of times more effective at warming the planet than carbon dioxide is being released at a rate far higher than countries around the world have acknowledged, raising a fraught question: What are they going to do about it?
Elevated concentrations of a chemical known as trifluoromethane, or HFC-23, were detected at remote monitoring sites worldwide, according to a study published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment in late December. The study concluded that 40 percent of the emissions came from eastern China, suggesting the country may be violating an international climate agreement.
The pollution poses a critical test to the Montreal Protocol’s Kigali Amendment—a binding agreement designed to curb the release of HFC-23 and other hydrofluorocarbons—and to the more than 160 countries that ratified it. The HFC-23 problem also highlights the need for more robust monitoring of highly potent greenhouse gases at a time when U.S. support, which helps underwrite the existing global monitoring network, may be on the chopping block.
HFC-23 is produced as an unwanted byproduct in the manufacturing of other chemicals, including those used to make Teflon. Pairing HFC-23 concentrations in the atmosphere with meteorological models, the researchers were able to tease out how much of the gas was released and in many cases where it came from.
Air samples collected at Gosan, a remote air monitoring station on a South Korean island facing the East China Sea, suggest China continued to emit large volumes of HFC-23 after ratifying the Kigali Amendment in 2021. That possibility was first reported by Inside Climate News in 2023, based on preliminary data.
A small number of chemical plants, including just two dozen factories in China, are widely believed to produce the majority of all HFC-23. The amendment requires them to destroy rather than vent the waste gas.
Doing so is one of the most cost-effective ways to combat climate change. Incinerators installed and properly operated at chemical plants can destroy 99.9 percent of waste HFC-23 at little cost. However, 14,000 metric tons of the pollutant were released globally in 2023, according to the December study.
The emissions are five times higher than the annual releases that countries reported to the United Nations in recent years. The pollution is equal to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of 48 million automobiles or 55 coal-fired power plants, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s greenhouse gas equivalency calculator.
“There is a powerful greenhouse gas that countries are, for whatever reason, not destroying, even though they should and have the means to, and that’s quite concerning,” said Ben Adam, a researcher in the School of Chemistry at the University of Bristol and the lead author of the study.
Emissions estimates in the current study are similar to those published by the Montreal Protocol’s own Scientific Assessment Panel in September.
“The science is pretty clear,” said David Fahey, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s chemical sciences laboratory in Boulder, Colorado, and a co-chair of that panel. “We kind of put it on the table for the [countries’] delegates to decide, is this important enough to do something about?”
Whether they take action may hinge on the meaning of four words.
“To the Extent Practicable”
Production of chlorodifluoromethane (HCFC-22), a chemical feedstock used to make other polymers, is believed to be the source of 95 percent of all HFC-23 prior to any incineration of the waste gas.
Countries that are parties to the Kigali Amendment agree to curb HFC-23 emissions from the production of HCFC-22 and several dozen other chemicals “to the extent practicable.”
The phrase leaves significant room for interpretation.
Incinerators, including ones installed in China in the 2000s through a U.N. program, have demonstrated the ability to destroy 99 percent or more of HFC-23 emissions. However, that high level may not be required.
“The term ‘to the extent practicable’ is not defined in the Protocol or in decisions by the parties, nor are there specific targets/schedules set for reduction in HFC-23 emissions to be achieved,” Megumi Seki, the executive secretary of the U.N.’s Ozone Secretariat, which oversees the Montreal Protocol, said in an email. “As long as the parties report some amounts destroyed per facility, we would understand that the party destroyed its HFC-23 emissions to the extent practicable.”
Climate advocates disagree.
“‘Practicable’ does not mean whether it was costly or not,” said Avipsa Mahapatra, climate campaign director for Environmental Investigation Agency U.S., a nonprofit based in Washington. “It means whether it was technologically feasible.”
Stephen Andersen, director of research at the Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development, attended the Montreal Protocol meeting in Kigali, Rwanda, in 2016 when the Kigali Amendment was adopted. He said the insertion of the practicable language was an unfortunate part of the “horse trading” that goes into any multilateral agreement. However, he said the agreement now needs to be re-energized to reduce climate pollution.
“Someone has to pressure the Montreal Protocol to do what they need to do before it gets worse,” he said.
Seki said the amount of HFC-23 that countries report as destroyed is “taken at the face value” and that there are currently no cases of non-compliance under investigation.
Mahapatra said the current study suggests that must change.
“The parties and the protocol urgently need to move beyond this hand waving self-reporting that we have seen so far, and really look into their real numbers,” Mahapatra said.
HCFC-22 is also manufactured in India, Russia and other parts of China beyond its eastern region. However, the Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment (AGAGE), the global monitoring network used to detect HFC-23, is unable to quantify emissions from these locations due to a lack of monitoring stations in these areas.
“Someone has to pressure the Montreal Protocol to do what they need to do before it gets worse,” he said.
— Stephen Andersen, Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development
In addition, other potential sources, including those whose chemical pathways and production volumes remain poorly understood, could account for a significant portion of emissions.
China and the world have reduced their emissions since the peak in 2019. From 2019 to 2023, emissions dropped 30 percent in eastern China and 19 percent globally. However, the reductions were nowhere near what was anticipated under the agreement.
A Decision With No Teeth
The HFC-23 issue was high on the agenda at a Montreal Protocol meeting last fall, but the talks led only to limited action.
At the meeting, a representative from the U.S speaking on behalf of the U.S. and Canada called for member countries to share data with international monitoring networks. Countries with substantial differences between reported and measured emissions should take actions to reduce them, the representative added.
A delegate from China, which produces more than two-thirds of the world’s HCFC-22—much of which is ultimately used in other countries—pushed back. More research and greater technical capacity is needed, the country argued.
A formal decision, which was reached on a consensus basis among member countries, called for the voluntary sharing of atmospheric monitoring data. The decision invited member countries with HCFC-22 production facilities to report how they calculate emissions of the powerful climate pollutant and to share information on best practices to reduce them.
In short, the group did not agree to any actions that would force countries to address the glaring emissions problem. And, while other countries could enact unfavorable trade policies against parties that do not comply with the agreement, the Kigali Amendment itself does not contain any penalties for failing to reduce HFC-23 emissions.
Meanwhile, China’s regulatory response has also lacked teeth. In September 2021, after the Kigali Amendment went into force in China, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment issued a notice requiring all HCFC-22 and HFC producers to fulfill the international agreement’s requirement to eliminate emissions to the extent possible. However, the ministry didn’t establish any specific emissions standard or penalties for failing to abide by Kigali.
In January 2024, the MEE followed up with draft rules laying out how companies should measure and report their emissions. That guidance set a standard of destroying 99.99 percent of HFC-23 emissions. However, after more than a year, the rules have yet to be put into effect.
In April, the ministry published a new national plan to implement the Montreal Protocol, including enhanced measurement, reporting and monitoring of HFC-23 emissions from HCFC-22 plants. But the plan did not include any details on enforcement.
In the U.S., a rule that took effect by early 2023 requires that chemical manufacturers producing HFC-23 emit no more than 0.1 percent of the waste gas relative to the total amount of the chemical intentionally produced at the facility.
As of 2023, no U.S. plant that produced HFC-23 exceeded that limit, according to the EPA.
The MEE did not respond to questions from Foreign Policy and Inside Climate News.
Hu Jianxin, a professor of environmental science and engineering at China’s Peking University, has conducted research on the super pollutant for years and contributed to China’s draft rules. He said HFC-23 is a key priority for the MEE.
“They really care about this issue, and also a lot of people are actually working on auditing,” Hu added.
He said he was not sure why the rules haven’t been implemented, but pointed to pushback from the affected plants. “The companies still complain,” he said.
Incinerators that destroy HFC-23 cost approximately $4 million to $7 million to install, depending on the size of the plant, according to data provided by the Chinese government to the U.N. in 2017.
However, starting in 2006, Chinese chemical companies received billions of dollars in incentives through a U.N. climate program, as well as subsequent subsidies from the Chinese government, to install and operate these incinerators at HCFC-22 plants in China.
Once incinerators are installed, operating costs range from $5 to $9 per kilogram of HFC-23 destroyed, according to data provided by the Chinese government to the U.N. One kilogram of HFC-23 has the same warming effect as 14,700 kilograms of carbon dioxide, which is why keeping it out of the atmosphere is an important part of efforts to combat climate change.
Not counting initial capital costs, which many plants recouped through the U.N. program, Chinese chemical plants can destroy HFC-23 at a cost of approximately 30 to 60 cents per metric ton of CO2 equivalent. Costs for carbon capture and sequestration, by comparison, range from $15 to $342 per metric ton to simply capture CO2, with additional costs for sequestration, according to the International Energy Agency.
But without subsidies or another way to profit from the emissions abatement, it is still an extra cost for companies. Hu pointed to a plant in China that has captured HFC-23 and converted it back into HCFC-22 as a potential model for other companies to reap economic benefits from cutting pollution.
Other Potential Sources of HFC-23
HCFC-22 plants are an obvious focus for reducing emissions because they are an established source of the climate pollutant and are widely considered to be the main contributor.
However, experts are debating the extent to which other industries are also contributing to the problem.
HFC-23 emissions are known to be produced or leaked from a wide range of other hydrofluorocarbon chemical plants, semiconductor manufacturing and other niche products. Hu and his colleagues have also measured small amounts of HFC-23 at other types of chemical plants in China. They are still far from knowing the proportion coming from each non HCFC-22 source, but he estimates that the total may be significant, given the scale of China’s hydrofluorocarbon industry.
“If there are too many of these kinds of small chemical substances, in aggregate it is still a big figure,” said Hu.
The transformation of HCFC-22 into Teflon is one major concern for scientists. That process can release additional HFC-23 emissions. Another recent study, based on local air monitoring in southern China, found that this process “could be emerging as an increasingly significant emission source of HFC‐23” and merits further attention since those plants fall outside of the Kigali Agreement’s reporting requirements.
“It is probably the most important of the remaining sources, but it is nowhere near as important [as HCFC-22 production],” Adam said.
There’s also always the possibility of illegal production of HCFC-22 as a refrigerant, which would not be subject to monitoring. HCFC-22 was once commonly used for refrigeration and air conditioning, but such use is being phased out under the Montreal Protocol as the chemical depletes the Earth’s ozone layer, which protects the planet from harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun.
Increasing limits on the production and use of the refrigerant could have the unintended consequence of causing illegal production at chemical plants that would be unlikely to incinerate their HFC-23 waste gas, said Clare Perry, a climate campaign leader at the Environmental Investigation Agency UK, a nonprofit based in London.
A limited number of cases of illegal HCFC-22 production have been reported in China in recent years, though the extent of that production remains unclear. Perry noted that there is also a precedent for widespread production of chemicals banned under the Montreal Protocol in China.
“It’s a very complex ‘whodunit. It might be like that Agatha Christie one where everybody did it.”
— Clare Perry, Environmental Investigation Agency UK
In 2018, scientists reported unexpected emissions of the ozone-depleting CFC-11 in atmospheric measurements. An investigation by the Environmental Investigation Agency determined that illegal chemical plants in China were producing the chemical for use in polyurethane foam. Subsequent enforcement efforts in China led to a rapid decrease in that pollution.
Scientists have also pointed to a less-direct source: the degradation of hydrofluoroolefins in the atmosphere. They are a new class of chemical refrigerants that have a far lower direct impact on the climate than HFCs. However, as they break down, they can form HFC-23.
“It’s a very complex ‘whodunit,’” said Perry. “It might be like that Agatha Christie one where everybody did it.”
One solution may be to simply make less of the chemicals that produce such potent greenhouse gases. Countries could agree to limit the production of HCFC-22 and other chemical feedstocks under the Montreal Protocol, IGSD’s Andersen said.
“These factories are just big chemical cocktail factories,” Perry said. “As long as you’re making products with chlorine and fluorine, you are basically risking having emissions of things that will either deplete the ozone layer or warm up the climate.”
As a starting point, environmental advocates say China must keep a much closer eye on its HCFC-22 factories to ensure they aren’t emitting or leaking HFC-23. Beyond that, Hu said that China needs to step up monitoring around other chemical plants to better understand the extent of leaks from those facilities.
As for global pressure, it remains unclear what role the U.S., which under the Biden administration led an unsuccessful effort for stronger action on HFC-23 at last fall’s Montreal Protocol meeting, will play in the agreement—or air monitoring—going forward.
The U.S. Department of State did not answer questions about the country’s involvement in the Montreal Protocol’s next annual meeting, scheduled for this fall. The Trump administration has moved to withdraw the U.S. from the broader Paris climate agreement, and its funding cuts and freezes have particularly targeted climate efforts.
NASA’s Earth sciences division provides at least partial funding to five of the AGAGE network’s 16 air monitoring stations worldwide. The Trump administration sought to cut funding to the division in half in the 2026 budget request it sent to Congress earlier this month.
“Everybody is afraid that they want to blind the science,” Andersen said. “Some people think if you don’t see it, it won’t matter. It’s the ostrich with its head in the sand.”
NASA has already canceled 145 grants and contracts totaling $113 million since late January, according to an online database compiled by The Planetary Society, a space advocacy group. Grants to two universities for the AGAGE network remained active as of May 2, NASA confirmed in response to a public records request by Inside Climate News.
Curbing global monitoring would put U.S. manufacturers at a disadvantage because plants operating in areas with no oversight could forego pollution controls and their associated costs, Andersen said.
“For the U.S. and Europe, who have done a good job of reducing their emissions while other countries are blowing HFC-23 into the atmosphere, this is unfair competition, this is outrageous,” Andersen said.
Phil McKenna is a reporter at Inside Climate News covering climate super pollutants. Lili Pike is a reporter at Foreign Policy covering U.S.-China relations, China’s foreign affairs and the country’s response to climate change.
Related News
26 Feb, 2025
Zimbabwe beat Ireland in rain-hit T20 se . . .
04 Mar, 2025
Bank of Ghana cautions banks against pho . . .
06 Apr, 2025
PBKS vs RR Highlights, IPL 2025: 3 momen . . .
18 Apr, 2025
Chelsea reach Conference League semi-fin . . .
18 May, 2025
Rebekah Vardy lands fly-on-the-wall Netf . . .
30 Apr, 2025
CRICKET-IPL-Narine comes good for KKR in . . .
14 Mar, 2025
WATCH: 'Sorry, thoda late hogaya' - Delh . . .
23 Mar, 2025
Salman Khan Spotted Posing With Young Gi . . .