Samples of tricks and anti-ecological scams. The judgment on Italy, the European country with the highest number of illegal imports of F-gas, is implacable. Substances for refrigeration and air conditioning in commercial and industrial environments - recognized killers of the atmosphere - continue to enter our country in a fraudulent way. Purchased on the Net through intermediaries who manage to escape controls. It detects it European Fluorocarbon Technical Committee (EFCT). Of the 228 infringements detected by the body in the first months of this year, 42 occurred in Italy. A substantial slice of a millionaire black market that proliferates in defiance of the specific European regulation on the use of these gases.
The European Fluorocarbon therefore launches an appeal for the good of the climate in the hope of stopping clandestine trade and bringing those who feed the system back to respect for EU principles. In Italy at the beginning of February there was the seizure of large quantities of illegal gas. Unfortunately, the engineers explain, the complexity of shipping routes and reseller markets make the business difficult to trace.
Yet the Regulation shared within the EU, aims to reduce the use of fluorinated gases by 79% by 2030. Ten years to find alternative solutions to cooling shopping centres, offices, skyscrapers and public buildings. To get an idea of the needs, in 2012 Italy imported 10.600 tons of F-gas. A terrible blow for our cities, given that 25 million tons of CO2 equivalent have been released into the air. Then came the regulation.
The economic convenience of the illegal market, evidently opposed to environmental protection and good plant management, makes the road to alternative positive solutions complicated, but not impossible. The machines can work safely with natural refrigerants. Propane, butane, ammonia have low environmental impacts and do not trigger penalties. On the other hand, the refrigerants in use damage the ozone layer of the stratosphere and put at risk emission abatement programs on a European scale. They are based on refrigerants using fluorite, with China and Mexico leading the world in extractions and sales.
The Italian legal framework, however, positively registers a useful agreement between the Ministry of the Environment and ISPRA for the study of alternatives to F-gases. The collaboration of the users is needed who - said Diego Boeri, member of EFCTC - in the end can unknowingly support criminal organizations and frustrate efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. They have to come to terms with business and ultimately corporate ethics. Because the doubt may arise that behaviors are not always involuntary. And it would be sorry.
