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DuPont has a 75 year history of leadership in the air conditioning and refrigeration industry. In 1931, DuPont commercialized the first CFC refrigerants as safer alternatives to the flammable and/or toxic refrigerants in use at that time. This development played a significant role in the rapid expansion of the industry to provide affordable and safe refrigeration and air conditioning systems. With the international recognition that CFCs and other substances were causing depletion of the ozone layer, DuPont again became a leader in developing sustainable cooling solutions. DuPont was awarded the National Medal of Technology, the highest honor awarded by the President of the United States, for “policy and technology leadership in the phase out and replacement of chlorofluorocarbons.”
DuPont has worked with other industry stakeholders to develop Responsible Use Principles for HFCs – with the goal of minimizing the environmental impact of HFCs. The principles outlined for responsible HFC use are exemplified in the Improved Mobile Air Conditioning Cooperative Research Program (IMAC). Martin Drigotas, DuPont automotive refrigerants manager, was awarded the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Climate Protection Award for his role as a founder of IMAC.
Environmental stewardship and real-world responsibility are part of the core company values that guide everything we do—starting with our own manufacturing and production. DuPont in 1991 committed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our operations and to increase energy efficiency. During the 1990s we reduced greenhouse gas emissions (carbon equivalent) from operations by approximately 50 percent globally. This was primarily through major process-change investments to reduce nitrous oxide emission in the United States, Canada and the UK, (with the low-emission technology designed-in at a new plant in Singapore), and through reductions in byproducts of fluorocarbon manufacture. We also held energy consumption flat, despite a 36 percent increase in production volume (approximately half this gain was from process and powerhouse efficiency improvements – half from product and process mix changes). DuPont has set business-driven internal goals for the current decade, anticipating both market pressures and opportunities as economies respond to the long-term climate challenge. These are aimed to position our businesses for the marketplace of 20 to 50 years from now – one which will demand less emissions and a markedly smaller "environmental footprint" from human activity. Specifically, by 2010, our goals are:
- We will reduce our global carbon-equivalent greenhouse gas emissions by 65 percent using 1990 as a base year. For purposes of our "scorecard," we use the gases focused upon in the Kyoto Protocol;
- We will hold total energy use flat using 1990 as a base year. This will require that our business growth be much more "knowledge intensive" and much less raw material- and energy-intensive than in the past – a move that is very consistent with our stated corporate goal of "sustainable growth"; and
- We will source 10 percent of our global energy use in the year 2010 from renewable resources. We are serious about the need for renewable energy to be a part of our future. We are providing a strong "market signal" that there will be at least one major energy consumer ready to buy; and that we will work with suppliers of renewable energy resources to stimulate their availability at a cost competitive with best available fossil-derived alternatives.
These efforts support our vision of creating sustainable solutions essential to achieve a better, safer, healthier life for people everywhere.
Learn more about how DuPont Refrigerants is leading the efforts to find environmental solutions:
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