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Earth Science

Scientists Race To Find Who is Pumping a Dangerous Gas Into the Atmosphere (theoutline.com) 355

An anonymous reader shares a report: When the research was published in Nature on May 16, it was like a bomb dropped. A greenhouse gas is billowing into the atmosphere from a source somewhere in East Asia that no one can identify at a rate scientists have never before seen, and it's ignited a scientific dash to get to the bottom of it. All countries are supposed to comply with the rules laid out in the 1987 Montreal Protocol, which banned the production of CFCs -- chlorofluorocarbons, which deplete the ozone layer and contribute to global warming -- with only temporary exception of a few economically developing countries. If everyone fulfills their end of the deal, the amount of CFCs in the atmosphere should gradually wane over the course of several decades. CFC levels plummeted through the 1990s, and then stagnated between 2002 and 2005. But in in 2014, mysterious toxic plumes of CFC-11 -- a type of CFC -- began to drift across the Pacific Ocean. Stephen Montzaka, a chemist who studies and monitors CFCs for The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), was shocked.
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Scientists Race To Find Who is Pumping a Dangerous Gas Into the Atmosphere

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  • China (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ickleberry ( 864871 ) <web@pineapple.vg> on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:04AM (#56709720) Homepage
    Without a doubt. The only problem is how to pin it to them. The political will also isn't there to pin it to them - too much money changes hands in the West on the back of Chinese goods being traded and we've become far too dependent on the Chinese for trinkets and future ewaste.
    • Now now, it is entirely possible it's India as well. Or a sooper sekrit dastardly plan whipped up by the Russians.

    • Not Thailand? Or Vietnam? Or Indonesia? There are so many possibilities.
    • Re:China (Score:4, Informative)

      by Carewolf ( 581105 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:36AM (#56709892) Homepage

      Look at the map. The plume is the densest over Hawaii and spreads east from there, there is very little west of it. I had no idea Hawaii was classified as East Asia though..

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • by Reziac ( 43301 ) *

        Like, maybe....

        http://cfc.geologist-1011.net/ [geologist-1011.net]

        Volcanic Halocarbons: Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) in Volcanic Emissions
        Abstract
        "Although commonly regarded as not naturally occuring, halocarbons and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) do occur naturally and are emitted from volcanoes."

    • by Megol ( 3135005 )

      China as a state? Unlikely.
      Someone _in_ China not following the laws to earn more? Pretty damn likely.

      Observe the difference between the two choices.

      • Re:China (Score:4, Interesting)

        by HornWumpus ( 783565 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @10:14AM (#56710112)

        What % of heavy Chinese industry does the Chinese communist party (aka the Chinese government) own? Hint: It's not 0.

        Add the % of heavy Chinese industry owned by family members of the Chinese central committee and you are closing in on 100%.

    • Without a doubt.

      Cool story, thanks for you insight. I mean we all know the rest of south east Asia is a shining example of cleanliness and responsible environmentalism.

      I mean you may be right, China is big and has a high population so statistically it could be them. But you didn't use statistics to make your decision, only bias.

    • Definately China (Score:5, Informative)

      by nhtshot ( 198470 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @03:25PM (#56712046)

      I used to live in China and was in the data center cooling business. R12 is all over the place there in the HVAC industry. Officially, it's prohibited. Unofficially, you can buy it from any A/C dealer in just about any city. I've been gone for a few years, but when I was there, R12 air conditioners were still being made and installed new.

  • Someone is doing (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AHuxley ( 892839 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:07AM (#56709738) Journal
    some quick old style enrichment of uranium and the CFC is the tell? Should have studied more and not released the one product the world still looks into.
    • by Rhipf ( 525263 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:37AM (#56709904)

      From my quick checking it looks like uranium enrichment releases CFC 114. The CFC detected here is CFC 11. So unless there is a process of enrichment that releases CFC 11 that I didn't stumble upon it looks like this isn't due to uranium enrichment.

      • American uranium enrichment releases 114. It's one of the allowed exceptions.

        There might be other processes.

  • by ArhcAngel ( 247594 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:07AM (#56709740)
    I'm not saying it's aliens...But it's aliens! (The extra-terrestrial kind not the undocumented immigrant kind) They are terraforming the planet for their impending invasion.
    • You have the making of a good book here...

      Aliens come to earth and say "Wow, nice planet. We just need to get rid of that many humans. Let's leak some stupid technologyies like burning fossil fuels, fission of heavy elements, toxic pesticides and herbicides and maybe some dangerous CFC chemistry. Maybe we'll also sprinkle in some flawed ideologies like nationalism and racism in order to trigger infighting. By the time they realize their errors it will be too late for them. When the colony ships arrive, we
    • Your "Reptilian Masters" wanting a warmer, wetter Earth... would actually explain a few things. ;)
  • and throw the book on them!

    Thanks,
    The world

  • If we're going to get a handle on the environmentally destructive nature of capitalism then we're going to have to legislate that environmental capital be a real thing in all UN nations. That is that when you pollute the environment that you are held financially accountable for the costs required to remove it from the environment.

    This tragedy of the commons has been going on far too long.

    • If we're going to get a handle on the environmentally destructive nature of capitalism then we're going to have to legislate that environmental capital be a real thing in all UN nations. That is that when you pollute the environment that you are held financially accountable for the costs required to remove it from the environment.

      Nice sentiment but let's get real. Until we can do something as basic as forcing oil companies to actually pay the full cost of the pollution their products generate we're not going to get nation states to cooperate. Hell we still subsidize fossil fuel companies to the tune of around $5 trillion globally every year and barely regulate emissions. Good luck getting that under control.

      This tragedy of the commons has been going on far too long.

      And as long as we have economically selfish "leaders" who think anything that hurts oil company profits is some sort of evil

    • by bill_mcgonigle ( 4333 ) * on Friday June 01, 2018 @10:13AM (#56710102) Homepage Journal

      Read up on marketable torts or watch a David Freidman lecture on the topic. Icelanders had this figured out a thousand years ago but the Church's systems of government got rid of it when they took over. What you erroneously describe as a failure of capitalism is actually a failure to select good systems of governance.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by HornWumpus ( 783565 )

      Check the history of eastern Europe and the USSR. Capitalism is fucking clean in comparison. All you have is a theory, Capitalism has history.

      Also: Fuck no. The UN is not sovereign. The general assembly are a bunch of self serving, corrupt clowns. Not just no, FUCK NO!

      • Check the history of eastern Europe and the USSR. Capitalism is fucking clean in comparison. All you have is a theory, Capitalism has history.

        A) I'm not speaking about doing away with capitalism, you nitwit.
        B) I'm implying we need regulation because capitalism by definition is not under the direct control of the government.
        C) Not sure what your issue is with the UN because you have yet to make a point.

    • Never get passed, Americans have veto power and are totally dependent on producing way way more CO2 per person than just about everyone. [economicshelp.org]
      • by jwhyche ( 6192 )

        Nice spin. Let me toss you one out there too.

        https://www.ucsusa.org/global-... [ucsusa.org]

  • Didn't he already outline his plan in that early 2000s documentary?

  • Whew! This time it wasn't me.

  • Sigh. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ledow ( 319597 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:27AM (#56709850) Homepage

    You know when you "recycle" all those old fridges and freezers.

    And it costs a bucket to throw them away.

    And then a market starts up around a slightly cheaper way to do it.

    And the company just takes your equipment, ships it abroad, to someone who just signs off that it's being disposed of properly (but who doesn't care because it's not his life he's hurting).

    And then the abroad country, not having any care at all for such things as they get a nice backhander to bury a bit of rubbish, just throws it in landfill..

    Yeah... there. That's where I'd start.

    Like when you GPS-track waste electronics and find out it almost all ends up in landfill in India, China, etc. and isn't even processed at all.

    • no, they don't throw it in landfill. they strip it and of course poke the tubing to let the CFCs out before selling it

      • no, they don't throw it in landfill. they strip it and of course poke the tubing to let the CFCs out before selling it

        I have literally seen the CFCs being withdrawn from refrigeration units before being sent overseas as scrap for recycling. Granted, that was here in California...

    • Re:Sigh. (Score:5, Informative)

      by WindBourne ( 631190 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @09:53AM (#56709972) Journal
      No, they have already figured out that it is WAY TOO MUCH to be coming from consumers. This is VERY LARGE scale.
  • The number of households with fridges and air conditioners is growing exponentially. Would hundreds of Asian cities with millions of households with leaky ACs not throw up a plume? https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
    • The number of households with fridges and air conditioners is growing exponentially. Would hundreds of Asian cities with millions of households with leaky ACs not throw up a plume? https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]

      Only if they got hold of still working 30 year old air conditioners, or someone have started making 1980s tech air-cons again.

      • That's not really hard to believe. Air conditioning with old style cfcs was a lot better... old cars used to frost the outlet vents.
        • Not only that, modern CFC replacements are toxic enough to kill everyone in the car if the coils develop a fast leak.

          • by jbengt ( 874751 )

            Not only that, modern CFC replacements are toxic enough to kill everyone in the car if the coils develop a fast leak.

            Bullshit.. For example, the LC50 for R134a is more than 500,000 parts per million while the LC50 for R12 is around 750,000 parts per million. In either case, that's a mighty big leak in an automobile to displace most of the air.

        • by jbengt ( 874751 )

          . . . old cars used to frost the outlet vents.

          Which could just mean they had insufficient airflow or were low on refrigerant.

  • This is all you need to know about any global environmental agreements
    "...with only temporary exception of a few economically developing countries."
    "If everyone fulfills their end of the deal..."

  • by ledow ( 319597 )

    CFC-11:

    Either someone's making a shed-load of fridges.
    Doing a load of resonance imaging.
    Or...

    "Trichlorofluoromethane was formerly used in the drinking bird novelty"

    • by slew ( 2918 )

      CFC-11:

      Either someone's making a shed-load of fridges.
      Doing a load of resonance imaging.
      Or...

      Someone's hyperscale offshore cryptomining datacenter has an unregulated cooling system which sprung a leak...

      If we are just tossing out things...

  • by Dances With Sharks ( 1472321 ) on Friday June 01, 2018 @11:43AM (#56710676)
    See: https://www.express.co.uk/news... [express.co.uk] "SCIENTISTS have concluded a spike in banned chemicals which threatens to cause fresh damage to the ozone layer can be traced to badly recycled air conditioning units and fridges in China."

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