Yep, they hold the patents to freon substitutes. Ironically, the Dupont patented freon substitutes are greenhouse gases and they are resisting the US introduction of substitutes that are widely used in Europe:
http://archive.greenpeace.org/ozone/greenfreeze/may1997/3obsolete.html At first, Duponts response to the Ozone Hole was similar to Exxon's response to global warming: http://www.wunderground.com/education/ozone_skeptics.asp On May 15, 9:57 pm, James Annan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Andrew Dessler ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > > My view of why climate change is different is that it's a harder, more > > expensive problem. Thus, there's a lot more incentive for people to > > come up with reasons to do nothing. > > The story I've heard is this: the real difference is that DuPont (who > were playing the role that the oil and coal industry does nowadays over > climate change, and that the tobacco industry did over smoking) > developed an effective alternative to CFCs. Suddenly, far from being an > imposition with economic downside, restrictions gave them a new > worldwide market to exploit (maybe even a monopoly protected by patents, > though that is a guess). The US administration changed its attitude > overnight. > > It's only 3rd hand at best though and I don't think I've seen it written > down, so perhaps the tale has grown a bit in the re-telling... > > The moral of the story would presumably be that we need to give the oil > industry a monopoly on solar panels, or something like that. > > James --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Global Change ("globalchange") newsgroup. Global Change is a public, moderated venue for discussion of science, technology, economics and policy dimensions of global environmental change. Posts will be admitted to the list if and only if any moderator finds the submission to be constructive and/or interesting, on topic, and not gratuitously rude. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/globalchange -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
