HFC Inventories for six countries now available

Inventories of hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) consumption in six countries Bangladesh, Chile, Colombia, Ghana, Indonesia and Nigeria are now available in the CCAC resource database. The inventories were funded by the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC) and carried out by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in order to establish the current consumption of HFCs, provide future projections of growth patterns by substance and sector, and to identify opportunities and challenges for transition to low-GWP alternatives for various applications.

In most countries the use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) is rapidly increasing in important industry sectors such as air-conditioning, refrigeration, solvents, foam blowing and aerosols – where they are used as replacements for ozone-depleting substances controlled by the Montreal Protocol. In Chile and Colombia, for example, the overall average growth in HFC consumption was approximately 80% in from 2008 to 2012.

The surveys also suggested that there were major differences in the types of HFCs that had the highest consumption in the last few years. For example, HFC-134a constituted approximately 38% of HFC consumption from 2008 to 2012 in Chile, while 2013 data from Bangladesh showed that HFC-134a accounted for 93% of the country’s HFC consumption. Meanwhile, in Ghana, 57% in HFC-134a consumption was recorded in 2014.

The HFC Inventories were reviewed by the participating countries and CCAC partners: Australia, Canada, Germany, Poland, and the USA.

These findings were originally reported at a UNDP CCAC side-event during the 27th Meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol (MOP27) in Dubai, November 1 – 5, 2015. During MOP27 there was an agreement to seek an amendment to phase down HFCs under the Montreal Protocol.