International News
FINDINGS OF R22 AIR-
CONDITIONERS
BEING DUMPED IN AFRICA
new report states that obsolete and inefficient room air
A conditioners, many containing ozone-depleting R22, are
being dumped in Africa.
The report, released in advance of World Refrigeration Day
at the end of June 2020, notes that as much as 35% of the room
air conditioners sold in many of Africa’s largest countries are low
efficiency units, and approximately half of these contain R22,
commonly identified as Freon.
R22 was originally introduced in the 1950s, however,
contributes significantly to the depletion of the Earth’s ozone
layer. The Montreal Protocol identified it as one of the worst
refrigerants, and from 2003 its phase-out began. From 2010
onwards, R22’s production was prohibited and only maintenance
and servicing associated with R22 was considered acceptable.
Environmentally Harmful Dumping of Inefficient and Obsolete
Air Conditioners in Africa, is published by the Collaborative
Labelling and Appliance Standards Programme (CLASP), an
international non-profit organisation promoting increased
energy efficiency standards, and the Institute for Governance &
Sustainable Development (IGSD).
The report looks at the extent of the dumping problem
across ten countries in North, West, East, and Southern Africa
– Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia,
Kenya, Tanzania, and South Africa – that account for 96% of the
continent’s RAC market.
It is said that 650,000 units are being imported annually to
African countries that do not meet common efficiency standards
above EER 3.0W/W (COP of 3), though their manufacturing
countries — including China, Japan, South Korea, and the United
States — maintain standards well above 3.0W/W.
In addition, 47% of RAC sales in the 10 African focus countries
are of units still using R22, with a market size of about 800,000
units. Most of the remainder of overall sales in the ten countries
use R410A, with a very small percentage of lower GWP R32 RACs
sold exclusively in South Africa.
ENERGY VAMPIRES
“With energy demand growing across the continent, addressing
environmental dumping issues would not only help countries
achieve progress on their climate action goals, but would also help
to ensure that African consumers gain access to affordable, highquality
appliances,” said Rebecca Schloemann, the lead author
from CLASP.
Tad Ferris, senior counsel for the IGSD, and a fellow lead
author of the paper described the inefficient ACs as “energy
vampires”, that were sucking up vital energy needed to
recover from the pandemic and economic slowdown. Stopping
environmental dumping and switching markets to efficient and
climate-friendly cooling is essential in a warming world where
heat and humidity extremes may soon exceed levels suitable for
human survival,” he added.
A quarter of the low-efficiency RACs containing obsolete
refrigerants were imported from non-African companies. Threequarters
were assembled in Africa by either local subsidiaries of
non-African companies, joint ventures between smaller African
assemblers and large, non-African RAC, or wholly independent
African RAC assemblers.
A large portion (82%) of the R22 units are assembled locally,
half of which come from joint ventures between local Egyptian or
Nigerian assemblers and international Asian companies. China is
the largest source of imported R22 RACs (57%), followed by Egypt
(11%), the US (3%), Nigeria (1.6%), and South Korea (0.6%).
The report maintains that the low-efficiency RACs put extra
strain on governments’ and consumers’ budgets. Customers
pay higher electricity bills and countries pay more for electricity
generation facilities, imported fuel, and electricity transmission
and distribution infrastructure.
The additional problem of environmental dumping of air
conditioning products with obsolete refrigerants increases future
demand for these damaging refrigerants at a time when they will
be expensive or unavailable in some markets, creating incentive
for illegal chemical manufacture and trade.
It calls on policymakers to halt environmental dumping and
encourage a transition to higher efficiency, low GWP RACs
through a number of recommended policies including ratification
of the Kigali Amendment.
It also calls for the implementation of energy efficiency policies
consistent with major countries of export, a revision of RAC tariffs
to ensure compatibility with energy efficiency goals and a ban on
the import of second hand, refurbished, and inefficient RACs. RACA
www.hvacronline.co.za RACA Journal I August 2020 13