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| Program | 20% | 2 votes | Total: 10 votes | |
| Tax | 80% | 8 votes |
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Add to FavoritesHow to Reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHGs) Emissions with Refrigerant Gas Tracking
Carbon emissions reporting, measured as both direct and indirect emissions, requires detailed tracking, maintenance carbon emitting systems, and record keeping of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) sources. Direct carbon emission refers to the energy each individual consumes in the form of fossil fuels and electricity that we use for transportation, heating, cooling and lighting.
Carbon (CO2) Emissions Reporting: It's the law.
In many countries, carbon emissions are required by law to be reported across an organization's entire footprint; hence the common term now in widespread use Carbon Footprinting. Carbon data and detailed records of energy, fuel, and refrigerant gas consumption fall under regulatory compliance rules and must be reported in paper, and increasingly, electronic format.
Similar forms of mandatory monitoring, tracking, and reporting of air, water and soil pollutants fall under the Montreal Protocol (refrigerants gases), The U.S. Clean Air Act (many pollutants), and The Kyoto Protocol (6 GHG gases).
EPA and State Regulatory Compliance
Air, water and soil pollutants resulting from emissions that go beyond the property line or are in excess of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and/or state compliance regulations must be reported in order to maintain a safe and healthy environments. In addition, there is a very high likelihood that the United States will follow suite with many other countries to mandate economy wide carbon emission reporting. Submission of carbon emissions reports help identify main sources of GHG (greenhouse gases) and track the volume emitted into the atmosphere so that these volumes may be ratcheted down over time.
HCFC Refrigerants - The cause of depleted Ozone and increases of GHG emissions.
This is the main basis and high-level background for carbon emissions reporting. Refrigerants gases add higher levels of carbon into the air due to the composition CFCs and HCFCs. The refrigerants used in commercial heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) or regular air conditioning (AC) units include Hydrochlorofluorocar bons (HCFC), chlorofluorocarbon (CFC) and perfluorocarbon (PFC).
Perfluorocarbo ns (PFCs) and Hydrochlorofluorocar bons (HCFCs) are a collection of commonly used refrigerant and aerosol gasses with a wide variety of other commercial applications. The common Ozone Depleting Substances (ODS) in use today are hydrochlorofluorocar bons (HCFCs) and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). These substances are organic compounds which consist of clorine, fluorine, carbon and hydrogen and are controlled under the rules set forth in Section 608 of the US Clean Air Act.
The U.S. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) documented that increased GHG emissions is the result of misuse of HCFC refrigerants. As a result of conclusion, the EPA has implemented protocols requiring owner or operators of refrigerant systems to accurately track their refrigerant usage. Refrigerants, referenced as fugitive emissions, make up one of the four main scopes of carbon emissions.
Carbon Emissions Protocols - Get to know these intimately (scope by scope).
The Climate Registry Protocol was written in preparation of mandatory monitoring and tracking or mobile (vehicle emissions), stationary (electricity production), and fugitive emissions (refrigerant gases). These possible sources of emissions are defined below as noted in The Climate Registry, the ISO standards, the EPA protocols, and the World Resource Institute requirements.
Mobile emissions are those which emanate from transport vehicles. Most commonly, these are emissions from the combustion of fuels in transportation sources and emissions from non-road equipment such as equipment used in construction, agriculture, and forestry.
Stationary emissions are those which come from a regular source but do not disperse over greater areas, rather remaining in concentrations in the specific source area. These are emissions from the combustion of fuels to produce electricity, steam, heat, or power using in a fixed location.
Fugitive emissions are air-born emissions that are not released through a stack, vent or other confined air stream. These fugitive emissions can escape from equipment leaks or evaporation. Examples include releases of sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) from electrical equipment, hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) releases during the use of refrigeration and air conditioning equipment, process equipment leaks, etc.
The EPA, ISO, World Resource Institute, and Climate Registry all have reporting protocols which outline, in a systematic way methods for collecting, calculating, and reporting carbon emissions. All protocols are available. There is not a single reporting protocol as of early 2009. The current carbon emission protocols being drafted, reviewed, and supported by businesses and various government agencies all dictate detailed reporting requirements. EPA rules put in place mandatory CO2 emissions reporting regulations. Companies must spend time getting to know the protocols to remain in compliance.
Critical Heads Up - Companies are facing a mind-bending challenge. They must understand the protocols, organize, collect, and report Greenhouse Gas emissions across their entire organization or face extra financial burden.
Where refrigerant gases prevail heavily in multiple sources, refrigerant reporting as well as refrigerant tracking will lead to a better phasing in of mandatory carbon reporting. Legal carbon emissions reporting pave the way for lasting reductions in carbon emissions and improved management of company assets. Measure reduction in CO2 emissions. The goal to keep focused upon is a cleaner environment through reduced use of harmful refrigerants and more efficiently managed companies.
Learn more about this author, Holly Gregory.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
Tax
First, let's understand that most of the world's pollution is caused by the utilization of fossil fuels; for transportation, power generation, and chemical production. And Carbon Dioxide production is enhanced by over 6 Billion people, and the meat animals used to provide food, said animals also producing Methane, another potential warming pollutant.
Then, let's recognize that the supply of such fuels are finite; that additions to reserves of these products may have paused years ago and many believe we have reached or have passed the tipping point wherein new discoveries and production are higher each year.
How then, to persuade energy "consumers," which in this case includes business and government, to properly value the energy product, which in view of steadily decreasing supplies, must be relegated to the "highest value usage?"
In my opinion, and in the opinion of energy economists, a straightforward "energy tax" on the different types of energy, with the proceeds directed at only alternative energy projects which, with technological support can stand on their own economically, or with minimal use of subsidies from an energy tax. Nuclear, wind, solar, water all fill this definition.
Well-desi gned mass transit, underground primarily, could easily help reduce the need for the types of road building projects that benefit a class of consumers-drivers, both commercial and personal, at the expense of others.
The fossil fuel tax must be high enough to generate the funds necessary to complete ten percent of the infrastructure each year, so that at the end of ten/fifteen years there is a working, viable "neutral consumption compared to base year 2009" Program, and potentially substantially lowered consumption of fossil energy at the same time in the U.S. And, world wide if other major industrialized nations adopt a similar approach. It is helpful to point out that per capita energy consumption is highest in the U.S. and lower almost everywhere else, primarily because other countries instituted energy taxes, primarily on transportation fuels, some years ago, effectively reducing transportation consumption substantially, as well as supporting and subsidizing alternative power generation sources.
France, for instance, generates almost eighty percent of it's power generation from nuclear power plants, Japan, Korea, Germany, and others have already recognized the rationality of this approach and are taking more steps every day to increase alternative energy inputs in their systems.
If we adopt the direct taxing of energy at the distribution point approach, we can expect some need for energy credits on behalf of consumers; we should offer no such credits to business, institutional, and industrial users, any costs absorbed by them will be quickly reflected in retail and wholesale prices, and will encourage mightily their demonstrated ability to reduce cost components of their production and distribution processes.
If a well-designed plan is instituted we can expect reasonable progress towards the ten/fifteen year plan.
There will be mistakes, to be sure; there will be delays for certain, but if the overall plan for mass transportation, alternative power generation, and transportation efficiencies are adopted and rigorously managed, we can expect great results.
It's worth while to mention here the potential for "Cloud Commuting" and "Cloud Education" and other" Cloud" infrastructure processes to save up to fifty percent of the time and energy now spent driving and commuting to work; the endless hours of transportation and horrible schedules for children that would be alleviated by Cloud Education, and so much more. A useful portion of the energy tax could easily help develop a whole new generation of workers and those being educated, to the degree that Work as we now view it will be forever changed, for the better. Education would become truly that, the ability to think and organize, plan and execute.
Once the "facts" are learned, then they provide the framework for the thinking process, which mentoring through Cloud could easily provide.
I have written about Cloud in a blog entry (http://1000opinions. blog.com/ Cloud Computing and the Economy.
All in all, direct taxing of energy most efficiently provides the rationale for reduced consumption and increased production on non-polluting alternatives through the proper use of the revenues generated.
Unfortunat ely, "cap and trade" or other versions of the same thinking, while admittedly offering some small hope for pollution and carbon emission plateaus, are not the answer.
More specifically, they represent a tax on consumers, a transfer of wealth to pollution producers (how can that be O.K.?), and most importantly, a disincentive to the kinds of alternative energy and pollution-reducing results that a direct energy tax would provide.
Learn more about this author, Barry Dennis.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
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