NF3, SF6 and the Doomsday Super Greenhouse Gases

De: R. Roy Blake

Narrado por: Virtual Voice

THE HIDDEN DOOMSDAY SUPER GREENHOUSE GASES

Scientists admit and the near apocalyptic LA fires clearly demonstrate, global warming is proceeding much more rapidly than predicted. Also quite clear is that our efforts to address climate change have been woeful failures.

The current politically correct strategy for addressing global warming is not only ineffective but is also creating a massively worse situation that threatens to doom mankind and most life on the planet.

Almost all of the efforts to alleviate global warming to date have been focused on carbon dioxide (CO2), the most benign of the greenhouse gases. The principal strategy has been to replace coal and gas electrical production with "clean energy," especially wind and solar photovoltaics (solar panels).

Nitrogen TriFluoride (NF3), a gas used in the manufacture of computers, flat screen televisions and SOLAR PANELS is 17,200 times more powerful a greenhouse gas than CO2. While CO2 levels in the atmosphere have barely inched upward and, in fact, have actually decreased in the US and EU, NF3 use has increased by 10-11% a year, and recent studies have shown that NF3 levels in the atmosphere are eight times greater than originally predicted. Currently NF3 is addressed only by a meaningless reporting requirement and even that is being ignored by China and others.

Proponents of terraforming Mars have advocated using NF3 and other super greenhouse gases to warm the Martian atmosphere to Earthlike levels. More likely, however, is that NF3, etc., will turn the Earth's climate Venus-like, a planet where lead is molten on the surface.

Why aren't the super greenhouse gases being more directly addressed? In the case of NF3 specifically, given its mind-boggling global warming potential and increasing usage, why have the world's governments and NGOs chosen to ignore it?

One motive might be bureaucratic embarrassment, after all the EPA awarded a prize to initial NF3 manufacturer for replacing an ozone depleting gas.

No doubt there has been lobbying pressure (and misinformation), such as a claim that only 2% of NF3 escapes into the atmosphere. Scientists, however, have found that the levels of NF3 in the atmosphere are eight times higher than if the 2% was valid.

Also, most NF3 comes from and is used in east Asia. The big four of which is China, Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. Agencies and nations may feel enforcement is impossible and return to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.