Greenies: Destroying the planet in order to save it?

The WaPo’s “Green” section published an article yesterday on how the chemicals that allegedly helped “solve” the ozone layer problem have been making the overall environment worse (h/t: ST reader Leslie):

This is not the funny kind of irony: Scientists say the chemicals that helped solve the last global environmental crisis — the hole in the ozone layer — are making the current one worse.

The chemicals, called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), were introduced widely in the 1990s to replace ozone-depleting gases used in air conditioners, refrigerators and insulating foam.

They worked: The earth’s protective shield seems to be recovering.

But researchers say what’s good for ozone is bad for climate change. In the atmosphere, these replacement chemicals act like “super” greenhouse gases, with a heat-trapping power that can be 4,470 times that of carbon dioxide.

Now, scientists say, the world must find replacements for the replacements — or these super-emissions could cancel out other efforts to stop global warming.

“Whatever targets you thought you were going to make,” said David Fahey, a physicist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, “it will be undermined by the fact that you have . . . additional emissions that you hadn’t planned on.”

The colorless, odorless replacement chemicals enter the atmosphere in tiny amounts, often leaking out of refrigerators and air conditioners, or escaping when those machines break and are improperly dumped. They now account for about 2 percent of the climate-warming power of U.S. emissions, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

That is still far less than carbon dioxide, which is produced by burning fossil fuels and accounts for about 85 percent of the problem. And it is less than the roughly 10 percent of warming from methane, which comes from sources including farm animals and decomposing trash.

But in recent weeks, these obscure gases have been given a higher profile in the carbon-dominated debate on climate change.

Last month, a group of scientists published a paper projecting that, if unchecked, the emissions would rise rapidly over the next 40 years. By 2050, they found, the amount of super greenhouse gases in the atmosphere might be equal to six or more years’ worth of carbon dioxide emissions.

Er, um – obvious (and hopefully not stupid) question: Was there not any way that any of the scientific “geniuses” who came up with the idea of HFCs could have tested them out in a controlled environment, done more research, or something to figure out whether or not the chemicals would do more harm than good to the environment before they were introduced for use? Second question: How much play will this report get in the pro-alarmist mainstream media? Will Dr. Heidi Cullen breathlessly report on the Weather Channel that some of the very same scientists/chemists in the agw community who were charged with “making our environment greener” are responsible for super greenhouse gases infecting our environment now to the point the same community is going to be charged with trying to find replacements for the replacements?

Final question: Anyone other than me see the irony in their implied suggestion that they should be trusted to “solve” the problem that their original “solution” helped create?

And there’s even more irony where that came from: Ladies and gentlemen, some of our global warming issues have indeed been created by man – the liberal male and female scientists who continually warn of impending doom if we don’t do something now. Wonder how many carbon credits they’ll have to purchase in order to offset their damage? ;)

Comments are closed.