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Air Pollution Monitor and Control
News Release from: RAL: Quality Assurance Association | Subject: German CFC recycling
Edited by the Processingtalk Editorial
Team on 27 May 2008
Environmental scandal: CFC recycling
saboteurs
Germany is acting incompetently in the control of CFC recycling: large quantities of the highly dangerous, ozone-depleting greenhouse gas are emitted to the atmosphere
The authorities stand on the sidelines, although the Merkel administration tries to appear pioneers for climate protection Sharp contrasts can be witnessed at Ripshorster Strasse in the heart of the Ruhr
This article was originally published on Processingtalk on 28 Dec 2005 at 8.00am (UK)
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In Oberhausen, the road runs through an idyllic nature protection area, while only a short distance further, in the Essen district of Dellwig, it leads to an ecological abyss: the junkyard at number 377A.
At this address, old refrigerators and freezers are towering up.
'We export these devices to Africa, in particular to Nigeria and Togo', Patrick Ojigbani, the managing director of the company, tells us - totally unconcernedly.
Further reading
Efficient fridge recycling is essential
This year's extreme summer weather has brought back into focus an environmental problem that is still seriously underestimated by the public in general: the effects of fridge recycling
Residual CFCs still a major cause for concern
For Europe, the number of refrigerator or freezer appliances containing CFCs still in use is estimated to be around 200 million - equivalent to about 100,000 tonnes of CFCs
Climate: A serious issue for fridge recycling
The World Climate Conference in Nairobi spawned alarming news on the state of global climate protection: It is essential that fridge recycling activities are subjected to rigorous critical appraisal
What seems like a side issue at a first glance, is really a fully fledged scandal.
Germany is the perpetrator as well as the site of the crime.
In this country, old refrigeration appliances are disposed of in an incorrect way.
This results in the emission of enormous quantities of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), which not only destroy the ozone layer, but are among the most aggressive greenhouse gases.
One ton of CFCs heats up world climate at least as much as 5000 tons of carbon dioxide.
While the government preaches all-round climate protection, the authorities look the other way, as in the case of the OIE company in Essen-Dellwig - although the fridges are well visible from the street, and the European Union strictly forbids an export into non-EU countries.
In the African heat, a discarded fridge from Europe usually works no longer than a few months.
Defective appliances are cannibalised for tinkering new ones.
The remains are disposed of at junkyards in the most primitive way, thereby emitting tons of CFCs.
The Essen case is merely the tip of the iceberg: where the disposal of old refrigeration appliances is concerned, Germany acts like a developing country.
The statutory provisions are incomplete and slack.
Such legal execution as the federal states should perform, is either insufficient or totally non-existent.
The low disposal standards demand a high price: according to calculations carried out by the Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH), about 4 million tons of CO2 equivalents are emitted to the air per year.
This is more than four times the quantity that the ambitious CO2-related programme for the refurbishment of buildings saved in 2006 by massive financial supports for roof reconstruction, heat insulation, and similar measures.
The responsible Federal Minister for the Environment, Mr Sigmar Gabriel, told Capital: 'DUH uses figures without relevance'.
From the appropriate specialist department of the ministry however, Capital learnt that the above-mentioned figures are taken 'very seriously'.
And rightly so: CFCs are so dangerous that even the small quantities utilised in asthma sprays are banned in this country since 2006.
And new fridges containing CFCs haven't been sold since 1996.
PUNY STANDARDS.
The impact of old appliances on the climate could also be avoided for the most part.
In German's neighbouring country Austria, recyclers succeed in extracting 91 per cent of the CFCs from old appliances in an environmentally friendly way, and disposing of these substances without any emission to the atmosphere.
The rate in Germany is a mere 42 per cent, so DUH expert Maria Elander has established.
'On average, German fridge recyclers keep a much lower standard compared to that common in other European countries', Elander explains.
Switzerland, Luxembourg and Sweden are other countries apart from Austria, which recycle in an exemplary manner.
Great Britain and even Greece achieve better results in CFC recycling than Germany.
Major causes for this malaise can be found in the 'Technische Anleitung zur Reinhaltung der Luft' (in short 'TA Luft', the German air-pollution law), which was amended in 2002.
Indeed, TA Luft stipulates a recycling rate of at least 90 per cent for the extraction of coolants from the refrigeration circuit.
However, this circuit contains only a quarter of the overall quantity of CFCs within the device.
The remaining three quarters are contained within the insulating foam layer, for which TA Luft doesn't stipulate any recovery rate and scarcely makes any provisions at all.
This circumstance has disastrous consequences.
Austria stipulates a recovery rate of at least 90% for the insulating layer.
Besides this, the requirements and inspections for the air-tight special plants for shredding the insulating layers together with the bodies of the appliances, are much stricter in Austria.
Operators have to attest to the authorities for the annual quantities of CFCs.
TA Luft, which does not require such an annual record, merely provides for one official inspection per year which, moreover, has to be pre-announced.
Thus the polluters have plenty of time for smartening up their plants for inspection day.
To make matters worse, the zest of the federal states responsible for the inspections is overmodest at times.
'I have heard from operators which have had very rare visits by the authorities if any at all', so Christoph Becker of the RAL Quality Assurance Association for the Demanufacture of Refrigeration Equipment reports.
RAL, the self-organisation of the industry, is seated in Luxembourg, has 65 members all over Europe, and watches over quality standards in CFC recycling.
By the way, only one of these members comes from Germany: SEG Umweltservice, based in Mettlach, Saarland.
And this enterprise is now operating in the neighbouring European countries exclusively.
Environmentally friendly CFC recycling is obviously no longer profitable in Germany.
Indeed, all over Europe the manufacturers of refrigeration appliances are responsible for the disposal of their produce.
Yet, costs vary in dependence of the stipulated environmental standards in each country.
In Austria, the market price per appliance which the recyclers charge to the manufacturers, is about eight euros.
In Germany on the other hand, recyclers receive less than two euros per appliance.
This dumping price is sharply criticised by experts such as the industry insider Erhard Hug: 'The price level of fridge recycling is so low in this country that enterprises try to avoid the extra cost of better services for CFC recycling'.
Improperly disposed refrigeration appliances increase the greenhouse effect: and Germany is violating its international agreements.
Results: Because recycling plants are not air-tight or otherwise unsuitable for treating refrigeration appliances containing CFCs, about four million tons of CO2 equivalents are emitted to the air per year from German junkyards.
This figure was generated by the Deutsche Umwelthilfe from data provided by the statistical offices of the federal states: these authorities record the number of CFC devices treated by each operation as well as the quantity of CFCs the operations convey to environmentally friendly disposal.
The problem will remain in existence for ten more years: fridges containing CFCs were sold in Germany until 1996.
According to trade experts, 36 million of these are still in operation in households, public houses and lunchrooms.
Currently, 2.4 million of these old devices are disposed per annum.
With its practices, Germany disregards the 1987 International Montreal Protocol for the protection of the ozone layer, and violates European law.
With its Regulation 2037 of the year 2000, the EU forbids the production as well as the export of appliances containing CFCs, and sets strict standards for CFC disposal.
In Germany, the CFCs from old refrigeration appliances are mostly blown into the atmosphere.
Environmentalists are appalled.
'Such low prices have the effect that, in some cases known to us, CFC recycling exists only on paper", DUH expert Elander rants.
Many an old appliance is not treated in a suitable plant but rather ends in an autoshredder where almost the entire quantity of CFCs contained in the device are emitted to the atmosphere'.
Elander has concrete evidence for this reproach.
Following cues from the trade, she inspected a junkyard owned by the Scholz group, which is one of the world's biggest steel recyclers with a staff of more than 3500.
They operate a shredder plant in Espenhain near Leipzig.
On a request by Capital, the enterprise declared: 'The Espenhain plant is neither authorised to dispose of refrigeration appliances, nor do they dispose of such devices'.
Recently however, the plant was inspected by two DUH experts who could hardly believe what they saw there.
At two in the afternoon, a lorry trailing two 40,000 litre containers open at the top and full to the brim of old refrigeration appliances, drove to the shredder.
The DUH associates estimated the number of devices at 200.
A crane hurriedly lifted these devices onto the conveyor which fed them into the shredder.
'Within five minutes the whole affair was over', recalls one of the DUH experts, who also took some photographs of several fridges that were left over.
According to Scholz this whole incident never actually happened.
As early as the end of October 2007, the environmentalist organisation had visited Espenhain, led by CFC specialist Elander.
However, that visit had been officially pre-announced and, lo and behold, not a single fridge was to be seen on the premises on that day.
The visitors were shown the shredder plant at the end of which the shredded materials are automatically sorted and stored in separate heaps.
In an unobserved moment during the guided tour, the visitors took the opportunity and pocketed some foam from one of the heaps.
According to a laboratory analysis, this piece of evidence contains residues of CFCs.
Elander: 'The specimen is obviously part of the insulating material from an old refrigeration appliance which was illegally shredded at the plant'.
Espenhain is no isolated case: one day after their visit at Espenhain, the two DUH experts struck it rich with the listed company Interseroh at their junkyard in Rostock: they took pictures of old fridges being shredded.
Upon request by Capital, Interseroh declared that they 'accept refrigerator housings depleted of hazardous substances for shredding'.
On 21 st April, Capital also visited the Rostock junkyard - without forewarning.
On this day there was, amongst other things, a refrigerator complete with insulation layer lying near the shredder.
A piece of foam from this device has subsequently been analysed by the Fresenius Institute.
The result is a 'very high degree of contamination' with CFCs of the R11 type which is five thousand times stronger in the climate heating effect, than CO2 .
In addition, the Fresenius analysis shows a 'medium contamination' with the even more dangerous CFC of the R12 type - which has 10,000 times the effect of CO2! Interseroh acknowledge that 'it cannot be excluded that the appliances delivered to us contain minimal quantities of residues of these insulating materials'.
Such scheming, in conjunction with low standards, explains the approximately 4million tons of CO2 equivalents that are emitted to the atmosphere each year in this country in the form of CFCs.
Mind you: this statistic doesn't even include the emissions resulting from illegal exports, so that the factual impact on the climate caused by Germany is much higher.
When it comes to the scrap trade, the industry is agreed: they are strictly opposed to exports of refrigeration equipment, since they want to recycle refrigerators in Germany and thereby benefit from the rising prices of metal scrap.
That's why the Federation of German Waste Disposal Industry exerts political pressure in Berlin.
'According to our information, many old refrigeration appliances are not being disposed of in Germany as scheduled, but are shipped to Africa from the port of Hamburg instead', says Peter Hoffmeyer, head of the Federation: 'In both ecological and economical terms, this is an unacceptable situation which the federal government, the state governments and the customs authorities should quickly rectify'.
Fast response is also key for the business success of the Essen trader Ojigbani, as he states in fluent English: 'We are fast, this is our business'.
He seems very self-confident, tapping some of the fridges standing in front of him, and admitting they all contained 'old gas' meaning they are 'not CFC-free'.
With his tall, athletic posture, Ojigbani is reminiscent of a US basketball star.
A player, sure enough, who will not be prevented from shooting by anything or anybody - neither by the environmental authority of the city of Essen, nor by the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Proudly he admits: 'I've been in this business for ten years now'.
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