Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Danish example on saving ozone shines at meeting Date: Wed, 18 Nov 92 16:10:35 EST Message-ID: \SE A;WORLD \HD Danish example on saving ozone shines at meeting \BY Christopher Follett \CR REUTERS NEWS AGENCY \DT COPENHAGEN COPENHAGEN - As representatives of 100 countries convene to tackle the pollution threat to the Earth's ozone layer, they will have a shining example of environmental conscience - their Danish hosts. Next week, a U.N. conference in the Danish capital will seek ways to end production of ozone-destroying chemicals. Denmark was one of the first Western European countries to awaken to the dangers of chemical emissions that scientists blame for eroding the ozone that shields the planet from harmful solar radiation. Ultraconscious of environmental issues, Denmark was also the first industrialized nation to set up an environment ministry, in the early 1970s. Twenty years later, Denmark, relative to its size, is the world's third-biggest spender on public-sector environmental research and development, after the Netherlands and Germany. Danes spend 3 percent of total state research expenditures on it. The latest U.N. report indicates that the ozone layer continued to diminish in 1992. Its decline is widely linked with increased incidence of cancer and lower farm crop yields. Danish emissions of the guilty chemicals called CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) that cause decomposition of the ozone layer fell to slightly more than half of the 1986 volume, according to the National Environmental Protection Agency. CFCs include freon, widely used in refrigerators, air conditioners and aerosol sprays. Industrial use of CFCs fell to 2,225 tons in 1991 from 5,660 tons in 1986. Denmark set a Jan. 1, 1994, deadline for a total CFC ban. "About half of the CFC used in Denmark is in insulating foam for district heating pipes and refrigeration systems, and the looming national ban has forced Danish industry to experiment with new and less dangerous materials," said Per Henrik Pedersen, an ozone expert from the environmental agency. Typical less toxic CFC substitutes are trichlorethan and the so-called transitional substances, HCFCs (hydrochlorofluorocarbons), which are 10 to 20 times less harmful to the ozone layer than CFCs. Denmark will phase out HCFCs when technically feasible. A major $430 million national environmental protection plan, passed by the parliament in 1988, called for the banning of CFCs by 1996. It imposed taxes to discourage their use and set up a $6.5 million development program to promote substitute technologies. The program has so far involved 30 projects, including new CFC-free insulation materials for district heating ducts, halon-free fire extinguishers and CFC extraction plants. Halon, 10 times more dangerous than CFCs, will be banned in Denmark next year. The special CFC tax brought in $2.2 million last year. "It is the chlorine content in CFCs which threatens the ozone layer most," Mr. Pedersen said. "Nonetheless, if we look at the gases' total effect on the ozone layer, we are talking of a 20 percent drop from 1990 to 1991 in Denmark, due to the fall in industrial use of the chemicals." This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM