EESI Praises Senate Approval of the Kigali Amendment to Phase Down HFCs, a Major Contributor to Climate Change

“The Senate ratification of the Kigali Amendment on a bipartisan basis is a major, long-overdue step forward in climate action,” said EESI Executive Director Daniel Bresette. “The Kigali Amendment will help us prevent up to half a degree Celsius of warming this century and promote the competitiveness of American-made heating, cooling, and refrigeration equipment in global markets.”
 

“HFCs are thousands of times more potent at trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide,” noted Bresette. “Eliminating HFCs will buy us precious time as we reduce carbon emissions.”

The Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol was adopted in October 2016 and has now been ratified by 138 parties. It calls on nations to phase down the production and use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) by 85 percent by 2036. HFCs are used in cooling and refrigeration, and were initially introduced as replacements for chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), which were depleting the ozone layer that protects life on Earth from harmful ultraviolet light. It was later discovered that HFCs are very potent greenhouse gases.

Congress has already enacted legislation authorizing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to set rules limiting HFCs as part of the bipartisan Energy Act of 2020.

The Montreal Protocol is arguably the most successful environmental treaty ever. A 2020 report by the EPA estimated that the Montreal Protocol will prevent over 443 million cases of skin cancer and 63 million cases of cataracts in the United States alone by 2100.