For the first time, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is using NOAA atmospheric measurements to help support a national inventory of emissions from an important family of greenhouse gases.
The family of gases, called hydrofluorocarbons or HFCs, were developed to replace industrial chemicals responsible for destroying ozone in the stratosphere and creating the annual ozone hole over Antarctica. While less damaging to the ozone layer, man-made HFCs are super-potent greenhouse gases in their own right. As ozone-destroying predecessors like chlorofluorocarbons - also potent greenhouse gases - have been phased out, HFC emissions and their concentrations in the atmosphere have increased dramatically.
Because of HFCs’ growing climate impact, the Kigali Amendment of the Montreal Protocol has established a schedule for the international phase-down of their future production and consumption. In the U.S., the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act of 2020 calls for an 85% reduction in HFC production and consumption by 2036.
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