The document discusses India seizing the opportunity to phase down hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) under the Montreal Protocol. It summarizes the recent agreement between the US and China to work together to phase down HFCs and how this opens the door for significant progress this year. It argues that leadership from India in supporting the HFC agreement would show the largest emitters working together to address climate change and could be viewed as a turning point in climate protection efforts.

1. Seeds of actions on Climate Change
Is it now India’s moment?
By
Rajendra Shende
Himalayan tragedy in the State of Uttarakhand and in neighboring area is
stark reminder of what Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has
been informing us about the frequency, intensity and uncertainty of its
timing of the extreme weather events. Though the tragedy in Uttarakhand
cannot be related directly and only to the climate change, it is wake up
call for India to take wide spectrum of actions to mitigate climate change.
Luckily these actions also have important side benefits and are not costly.
One of such ready opportunity that India has, is to charter its actions
towards climate-friendly and energy efficient air conditioning and
refrigeration that consumes nearly 40 % of India’s electricity. India’s
dependence on fossil fuel to produce and reach such electricity to the user
is causing serious blows to its energy planning, its trade balance and
emissions of Green House Gases. It is true that India cannot give up its
dependence of the fossil fuel in near future; however, there are win-win
strategies available. One of them is to mitigate the climate change by
reducing the use of refrigerant gases of high Global Warming Potential
(GWP), replace them with low or zero GWP refrigerant gases and at the
same time leverage the possible energy efficiency advantage of
appliances using alternatives. Indian industry is ready to respond to this
strategy and Indian government can seize the timing.
Two and half decade back, India seized similar opportunity under the
Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the ozone layer. India’s
record of implementation of the Montreal Protocol, considered as the
most successful multilateral environmental agreement by any standard so
far, has been impeccable. It has phased out of the production and
consumption of Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and other Ozone Depleting
substances well in time and in some cases even before the time limits
stipulated under the Montreal Protocol.
India has also been global leader in giving strategic direction and shaping
the collaborative approaches for the success of the Montreal Protocol. Its
stewardship has played crucial role in formulation, establishment and
efficient operation of the Multilateral Fund for the developing countries
that is now operating for two decades without any financial crunch
whatsoever. But the real ‘win’ under the Montreal Protocol was not just
phase out of CFCs, but deriving societal benefits from use of alternative
refrigerant and upgraded technology that made appliances and equipment

2. more energy efficient. For example, the drive India started in 1990s for a
‘CFC-free energy efficient’ refrigerator has paid off. Today, all the
refrigerators in Indian market are CFC free and are at least 50% more
energy efficient. Climate benefit, though unintended, was another huge
‘win’ for the Montreal Protocol. As another global benefit that the
Montreal Protocol CFCs are also powerful GHGs, by phasing them out,
the world could eliminate more than 130 Gigatones of CO2-eq of GHGs
till 2010.
USA-China Presidential summit in California on June 8, 2013 included
an agreement that was rather non-political and technically complex for
the ‘popular’ press but it is critically important for India to reflect on it
seriously and on urgent basis. USA and China, two of the world’s largest
consumer and producers of Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs)-the powerful
green house gases of very high global warming potential, agreed to work
together on their phase down. This indeed is a critically significant new
initiative by USA and China in response to continually daunting
challenge of global climate change.
Both countries, as per the statement released on 9th
June by the White
House, Washington DC, ‘ will work together and with other countries to
use the expertise and institutions of the Montreal Protocol to phase down
the consumption and production of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), among
other forms of multilateral cooperation’.
Significance of this agreement stems from the facts that a global phase
down of HFCs could potentially reduce about 100 gigatons (Gt) of CO2
equivalent by 2050, equal to roughly two years worth of current global
greenhouse gas emissions and more than the United States emits in an
entire decade. This will also avoid 0.5 degrees Celsius of warming by the
end of the century and make a major contribution to keeping temperature
increases to less than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-Industrial levels.
Phasing down HFCs will also catalyze energy efficiency improvement in
the air conditioners, refrigerators and other equipment that presently use
HFCs, as has been seen in other such technology transitions. Such energy
efficiency would provide additional indirect climate benefit by
significantly reducing CO2 emissions from electricity use.
Second, the agreement comes at the time when the scorching and
frustrating details of global warming updates are emerging as time passes
by. The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere reached a record peak of
400 parts per million on May 9, the highest level in the history for 2.5
million years as per National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

3. (NOAA), USA. On June 5, United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP) presented in climate meeting in Bonn the widening emission gap
between what world is aiming for and where it is headed in 2020 in its
ambitious efforts to limit the global rise of temperature to 2 degree
centigrade. Such observations by UN body are making the climate-
scientists and policy-makers nervous. The gap, as concluded by 43
scientific groups from 22 countries, is whooping 8 Gt of CO2 equivalent
under the ‘most ambitious’ scenario and 14 Gt of CO2 equivalent under
business as usual. Further, as per report released on June 10 by
International Energy Agency (IEA), Redrawing Climate-Energy Map
gives stark warning that ‘The path we are currently on is more likely to
result in a temperature increase of between 3.6 °C and 5.3 °C.’ Such rise
in temperature directs towards disastrous consequence and even collapse
of human civilization. Though damaging floods in Uttarakhand cannot be
directly related to climate change impact, it is early warning of what is
expected in future in terms of the frequency and intensity of extreme
weather events, also highlighted in the special report of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
HFCs are powerful greenhouse gases used in refrigerators, air
conditioners, and industrial applications. Their emissions are controlled
under the Kyoto Protocol, which will come to an end in 2015. HFCs do
not deplete the ozone layer, and hence their use is growing rapidly as
replacements for ozone-depleting substances that are being successfully
phased out under the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the
Ozone Layer. Left unabated, HFC emissions growth could grow to nearly
20 percent of carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, a serious climate
mitigation concern.
For the past four years, the United States, Canada, and Mexico as well as
the Federal States of Micronesia and Morocco have proposed separate
amendments to the Montreal Protocol to phase down the production and
consumption of HFCs. These efforts to phase down HFCs are now
supported by 112 of the 197 countries that are Parties to the Montreal
Protocol. The amendments also include financial assistance to cover the
incremental cost component for developing countries and leaves
unchanged the reporting and accounting provisions of the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change and Kyoto Protocol on HFC emissions.
Though majority of the Parties to the Protocol agreed to phase down of
HFCs, India and China have consistently opposed any phase down of
HFCs under the Montreal Protocol for several reasons, one being that the
industries in their countries have adopted to HFCs to eliminate CFCs and
will now be adopting to HFCs to eliminate HCFCs.

4. The HFC agreement between President Obama and President Xi opens
the door to a significant progress this year to phase down HFCs under the
Montreal Protocol. India must still agree, of course, but they have been
showing greater flexibility this year even before the Chine-US agreement,
which now makes the amendment all but inevitable. Reluctance from
India risks leaving India on the sidelines as China and the U.S. develop
their special relationship.
It is significant that the Obama-Xi agreement really builds on Secretary
of State John Kerry’s earlier efforts in China to form a climate task force.
Secretary Kerry also made the HFC phase-down under the Montreal
Protocol a priority of his participation in the Arctic Council summit last
month, bringing Russia into the growing consensus. This follows the
success of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton who made
significant progress in putting the HFC issue on the climate-agenda
during Indo-US bilateral talks in. Ms. Clinton also made phasing down
HFCs a key part of the Rio+20 summit declaration, supported by more
than 100 heads of state. Ms. Clinton also made reductions of HFCs part
of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition to Reduce Short-Lived Climate
Pollutants, which she launched in February 2012.
Leadership from India to support the HFC agreement would signal that
the world has entered a new period where the largest emitters, both
developed and developing, are working side by side to address our most
critical climate issues. While efforts to cut CO2 and other climate
pollutants will continue to be a challenge, future generations will view an
HFC agreement as a turning point in climate protection, when the world
finally began to take effective action.
Secretary of State John Kerry will be in India this week and India should
lend its support on priority for HFC phase down under the Montreal
Protocol. It would also open the door for another round of discussion at
higher level when Indian Prime Minister visits Washington DC later this
year. Three largest economies of the world working shoulder to shoulder
to take action on climate change would be good omen and a strong signal.
END
Author: Rajendra Shende is Chairman TERRE Policy Centre, Indian think-tank and
former Director, UNEP. He was coordinating lead author of special report of IPCC
‘Safeguarding Ozone Layer and Global climate system’ and Steering Committee
Member of UNEP report on ‘HFCs: A Critical Link in Protecting Climate and the
Ozone Layer’