A Fast hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) Phase Down is Less Expensive than Slow!

20 October 2025 - Montreal Protocol insiders and scholars from Brazil, China, Costa Rica, Ghana, and the United States have authored a new paper documenting that faster phasedown of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) to help avert near-term climate tipping points will cost less than the existing schedule. The paper, HFC Phasedown Under the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol Is Less Costly If Fast Than If Slow, highlights how:

• New owners of cooling equipment who will benefit from lower cooling and service costs minimized by bulk procurement or buyers clubs;
• Neighborhoods and cities that will experience reduced pollution from fossil fuel power plants;
• Families and communities will benefit from electricity savings spent locally on goods and services that support quality of life and prosperity;
• National governments will enjoy lower compliance costs for stratospheric ozone and climate treaty obligations, and from improved balance of payments and lower interest rates for public investments.
• Non-Article 5 donors to the Multilateral Fund (MLF) that will have less to pay

Authored by Stephen O. Andersen, Jianxin Hu, Pengnan Jiang, Suely Carvalho, Richard Ferris, Xiaopu Sun, Kofi A. Agyarko, Ziwei Chen, and Marco González.

Available for download here.