Outsourcing Global Warming

Al Gore’s documentary, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ may have won an Oscar, but the man himself is no longer on the VIP guest list of many manufacturing companies across America and Europe. All this fancy talk about greenhouse gasses is costing them billions of dollars. Scrubbing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses requires the installation and operation of very expensive equipment.

Politicians in the West, sensing the popular mood, are putting the screws on manufacturing companies to clean up their act – literally: and very reluctantly, I might add. After all, it is these very giant organizations that make hefty contributions towards their re-election campaigns. It’s a catch-22 situation; and my heart bleeds for them.

Turns out my tears were unnecessary. Like the saying goes, you cannot keep a good capitalist down. The big boys of chemical manufacturing have worked out a sweetheart deal, which lets the politicians off the hook and keeps their profits intact. They are simply outsourcing greenhouse gasses. In an age where outsourcing is the name of the game, it was inevitable, really.

The deal is part of the new so-called carbon market, where firms in developed countries pay those in developing nations to reduce their production of greenhouse gasses. By doing do, Western companies can maintain or increase their own output of carbon dioxide in a trade-off. Thus, the global equilibrium is maintained and no one has cause for complaint. Yeah, right!

Here’s how it works out in reality. A British chemical company is paying out a substantial amount to a company in India, which produces refrigeration gasses. The Indian company will use part of the money to set up token scrubbing equipment, and use the rest to expand its production of a chemical called HCFC-22, used in refrigerators and air-conditioning systems. A by-product of its manufacture is a gas called HFC-23, which is a thousand times more damaging than carbon dioxide. Go figure.