
Home insulation in China blamed for rise in emissions of ozone-depleting gas - gadders
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-44738952
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merricksb
Active discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17488719](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17488719)

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FrozenVoid
Previous discussion
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17090224](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17090224)
This is reversing the ozone recovery progress made with Montreal protocol
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreal_Protocol)

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iKSv2
The days after Montreal Protocol gave me so much positive hope for the
world...

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jacknews
Chinese "goods" are cheaper due in part to many factors like this. I'm not at
all a fan of blanket tariffs, but simple free trade doesn't seem to have the
stomach to deal with this imbalance in standards, or standards enforcement.

I think if instead of just certifying products for safety etc, the entire
process by which they were made was also subject to certification, grading
etc, that could be an answer. ie products attract a higher tariff if the
producer has poor labor, environmental, safety, community practices, along
with grading the quality, durability, repairability of the products
themselves.

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londons_explore
Ever wonder why humans, who have predominantly lived and worked outdoors until
the last century, suddenly need suncream to go outdoors?

Ancient texts don't talk of terrible sunburn, everyone having skin cancer, or
anything like that.

My guess is the main cause is ozone depletion:
[https://www.nasa.gov/images/content/433982main_percent-
chang...](https://www.nasa.gov/images/content/433982main_percent-change-
Full.jpg)

UV-b has increased substantially since 1979, and considering CFC gasses were
first used in the 1930's, it's likley that UV-b has very significantly
increased since then.

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Zealotux
You could also argue that people were wearing much more clothes back then,
covering most parts of their body, and avoided staying exposed to the sun for
too long. Also: the life expectancy was lower, and skin cancer probably not as
easily identified as today.

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userbinator
CFC-11 is an... odd choice of blowing agent. It's a liquid at room temperature
and boils slightly above, compared with the majority of others I know of which
are gases. But apparently it is used, here's an interesting read:

[http://www.polymerjournals.com/pdfdownload/850527.pdf](http://www.polymerjournals.com/pdfdownload/850527.pdf)

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jacknews
It may be difficult to enforce the rules on thousands of foam companies, to
get them to use something worse and more expensive.

But there must only be a handful of factories making the stuff. That should
obviously be the target.

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zfdrdg
I saw this when the initial report was posted and I've been wondering why the
Trump administration hasn't jumped on it. Whatever Trump thinks about the
environment, it seems like this could be used as trade war ammunition.

~~~
est
The key ammunition should be the Great FireWall. If you want to make money in
China you gotta increase western influence, which GFW effectively eradicated
99%.

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est
dup of
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17488719](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17488719)

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anilakar
Time to put those sanctions into good use. Mr T, take a hint _nudge_ _nudge_

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westmeal
Palm held directly to face.

