Oh, well, I do agree that if we just tried to scale up the current fossil-fuel-based economy to the world, that would be ecologically catastrophic. But the infrastructure to do that doesn't exist either! And we're already on the path to switching over to renewable energy, not because of political will but because it's cheaper than fossil fuels in most of the world now. It's definitely possible to implement at scale—as demonstrated by the fact that even in your own country 80% of electrical generation is already solar and wind. That won't solve overfishing or feedlot-induced aquifer eutrophication, but I think we can eliminate those with relatively minor lifestyle changes, changes that will require political will.
I think the case of refrigerators is particularly interesting. Other than energy, they don't consume limited resources; they just contain limited resources until they're thrown away. Some of those resources are scarce, like copper, aluminum, and the refrigerant itself, and because it's profitable, those tend to get recycled already, even without government mandates (though sometimes government mandates can prevent it, like the "steps to stop illegal trade in HFCs" mentioned in the article you link). Others are not scarce, like iron, fiberglass, and polyurethane, so it isn't a problem if they are locked up in a landfill. At some point mining landfills will be profitable when the mineral resources they contain are depleted in their original mine deposits.
The problem of leaks of fluorinated refrigerant is real, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change#Greenhouse_gase... says that total fluorinated gas (including refrigerants from air conditioners and refrigerators, propellants, sulfur hexafluoride, and others) is only about 3% of the total greenhouse forcing, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas_emissions#/medi... gives 2.1%. Plausibly this is the largest climatic effect of buying a refrigerator, even if it's manufactured with 100% coal energy, but in absolute terms it's not that significant. And I don't think the number of refrigerators is going to more than double; according to https://globaldatalab.org/areadata/fridge/?levels=1%2B2%2B3%... even in Bangladesh 40% of households have one, and 35% in India and 99.9% in China; and https://bigee.net/media/filer_public/2012/12/04/bigee_doc_2_... gives the number as 1.4 billion domestic refrigerators ten years ago. So we might see that 3% grow to 5% or something, but not a high enough level to make a real difference. I don't think it's accurate to describe 3%, or even the 10% in the article, as "a huge part in global warming".
I used to have a refrigerator that didn't use greenhouse-gas refrigerants. It was an ammonia-absorption refrigerator, using ammonia, water, and hydrogen. These are unfortunately not available in my country (illegal, I think), and it is not safe to have them inside a house, but it's perfectly reasonable to keep them out on the patio. One big plus is that they can run on stored fuel, whether natural or synthetic, which would be really nice with the frequent power outages where I live now.
Sort of by coincidence, I've been trying to figure out this month how far desiccant-enhanced evaporative cooling can replace conventional vapor-compression air conditioning. I think I've found ways to reduce the system cost low enough that multistage cascades are economical, which ought to make it possible to do not only air conditioning but even domestic food refrigeration with desiccants, though freezing will require a different approach. I found some really interesting research from NREL on this, mostly over the last decade. Desiccant-based systems have the potential to provide not only cooling but also humidity control, heating, food preservation, and household solid waste treatment, and they can run on stored energy for days, which is important both during power outages and to ameliorate the intermittency of solar and wind energy.
I think the case of refrigerators is particularly interesting. Other than energy, they don't consume limited resources; they just contain limited resources until they're thrown away. Some of those resources are scarce, like copper, aluminum, and the refrigerant itself, and because it's profitable, those tend to get recycled already, even without government mandates (though sometimes government mandates can prevent it, like the "steps to stop illegal trade in HFCs" mentioned in the article you link). Others are not scarce, like iron, fiberglass, and polyurethane, so it isn't a problem if they are locked up in a landfill. At some point mining landfills will be profitable when the mineral resources they contain are depleted in their original mine deposits.
The problem of leaks of fluorinated refrigerant is real, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change#Greenhouse_gase... says that total fluorinated gas (including refrigerants from air conditioners and refrigerators, propellants, sulfur hexafluoride, and others) is only about 3% of the total greenhouse forcing, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas_emissions#/medi... gives 2.1%. Plausibly this is the largest climatic effect of buying a refrigerator, even if it's manufactured with 100% coal energy, but in absolute terms it's not that significant. And I don't think the number of refrigerators is going to more than double; according to https://globaldatalab.org/areadata/fridge/?levels=1%2B2%2B3%... even in Bangladesh 40% of households have one, and 35% in India and 99.9% in China; and https://bigee.net/media/filer_public/2012/12/04/bigee_doc_2_... gives the number as 1.4 billion domestic refrigerators ten years ago. So we might see that 3% grow to 5% or something, but not a high enough level to make a real difference. I don't think it's accurate to describe 3%, or even the 10% in the article, as "a huge part in global warming".
I used to have a refrigerator that didn't use greenhouse-gas refrigerants. It was an ammonia-absorption refrigerator, using ammonia, water, and hydrogen. These are unfortunately not available in my country (illegal, I think), and it is not safe to have them inside a house, but it's perfectly reasonable to keep them out on the patio. One big plus is that they can run on stored fuel, whether natural or synthetic, which would be really nice with the frequent power outages where I live now.
Sort of by coincidence, I've been trying to figure out this month how far desiccant-enhanced evaporative cooling can replace conventional vapor-compression air conditioning. I think I've found ways to reduce the system cost low enough that multistage cascades are economical, which ought to make it possible to do not only air conditioning but even domestic food refrigeration with desiccants, though freezing will require a different approach. I found some really interesting research from NREL on this, mostly over the last decade. Desiccant-based systems have the potential to provide not only cooling but also humidity control, heating, food preservation, and household solid waste treatment, and they can run on stored energy for days, which is important both during power outages and to ameliorate the intermittency of solar and wind energy.