Pacific wants out on ozone depleting substances

International and regional environment groups, at an Apia meeting this week, are encouraging Pacific Island countries to cut the use of ozone depleting substances (ODS) in the region.

Following earlier evidence of holes appearing in the ozone layers above both the Artic and Antarctic circles, chloroflurocarbones (CFCs) were banned in many industrialized nations.

Now hydroflurocarbons (HFCs) commonly used in household refrigerators and aerosol cans, and at first thought to have been relatively harmless, have also been identified as having a negative impact on the ozone layer.

In response the international community has called on nations to sign the Montreal Protocol that requires HFCs to be eventually phased out. So far 11 Pacific nations have responded. Of those, eight will be at the three-day meeting this week to encourage other countries and territories including the Cook Islands, Nauru, Niue and Palau to follow suit.

Backing up the Protocol will be a project run by the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) for the gradual removal of all HFCs. Delegates will also look at their own National Compliance Plans, and how they can be locked into an overall strategy for the region.

Already the United Nations Environment Program (UNEF) and SPREP, which will both have delegations attending, have provided technical and financial assistance to some of the island states, while Australia and New Zealand are also offering project help.

Last year New Zealand trained 15 refrigeration technicians from five Pacific countries in how to minimize ODS emission levels, as well as identifying new low and non-ozone depleting refrigerants.

The Montreal Protocol has been signed by Fiji, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, the Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The meeting ends on today.