Refrigerant Gas in End-of-life vehicles
The objective of this assignment was to identify the nature and scope of the environmental impacts from refrigerant gas in ELVs in terms of emissions to atmosphere, the nature of the impact; sources and causes, and the scale of the impact relative to emissions from other RAC sectors. The findings of this study will inform the review of the Ozone Protection and SGG legislation in 2015/6. Summary of findings were:
In 2013 approximately 658,000 passenger and light commercial vehicles were not re-registered in Australia. Approximately one third of these vehicles were damaged by a collision or event, or were part of the relatively small number of vehicles that were stolen. Approximately two thirds were not re-registered and retired from use as a result of old age, mechanical breakdown or due to economic circumstances decided by the vehicle owner.
The average age of all vehicles in the fleet is 10 years, and the average age at retirement is 18.6 years with standard deviation of 6.3 years. However some ELVs are obviously going to be much older, and some near new.
It is estimated that as much as one third of all end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) had no residual refrigerant charge when dismantled or crushed. However, across the entire population of ELVs it is estimated that they contained on average 340 grams of refrigerant gas each. In aggregate, ELVs in 2013 were estimated to contain approximately 187 tonnes of high global warming potential (GWP) refrigerant, comprising 166 tonnes of HFC-134a and 21 tonnes of CFC-12.
While we expect up to 10 per cent of that pool was recovered, that still means that the equivalent of more than 400 kt CO2e was estimated to have been emitted.
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