South Africa National Cooling Plan

Summary

In 2015, South Africa signed the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Paris Agreement to fight against climate change. In 2019, South Africa ratified the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol to reduce the consumption and production of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs). Addressing the environmental impacts of cooling products converges the objectives of these two treaties.
Cooling products are the main source of HFC use and they consume a significant amount of electricity produced from emission intensive coal fired power plants. South Africa’s efforts to mitigate global warming can therefore be amplified if the energy efficiency (EE) of cooling products is improved at the same time a refrigerant transition from HFC is considered. If this national cooling plan is implemented, the country could save 13.3 MtCO2 by 2030. This is a substantial contribution that could be made for the South Africa Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) which is at the heart of the Paris Agreement (PA) to fight climate change and limit global warming to below 2 °C, with 1.5 °C as a target.
 

Available documents

Format PDF

Pages: 60 p.

Available

Free