A History of the Navy's Strategic Reserve of Ozone‐Depleting Substances

Abstract

The domestic production of the most powerful Ozone‐Depleting Substances (ODSs) has permanently ceased and the abundant supplies of a number of refrigerants, fire‐fighting agents, and solvents, once taken for granted, are now a thing of the past. The Navy has adopted a successful strategy for addressing the threat posed by the unavailability of ODSs and that strategy includes relying on a strategic reserve of ODSs. Considering that the strategic reserve will play a critical role in sustained Fleet operations well into the next century, it is important to record the history of the reserve and to document lessons learned in order to educate future generations that may be faced with similar challenges. This paper documents the history of the Navy's effort to define, establish, and monitor a reserve designed to support Fleet operations until the middle of the next century.

Climate Change and the Future of Shipping and Ship Design

“…The most notable environmental treaty to follow the ratchet effect is probably the Montreal Protocol, whereby in a few short years the parties to the treaty moved from relatively modest production limits on ozone-depleting substances to outright production bans. So it would not be unexpected for the Kyoto Protocol to sharpen its teeth over time in response to the increasing threats of climate change (for a thoughtful discussion on the evolution of the Montreal Protocol, see Breslin, 1999…”

“…The Clean Air Act of 1990 established a schedule for the phase out of production of ODSs and granted the President authority to accelerate the cessation of production (Clean Air Act, 1990), which was exercised in early 1992 (White House, 1992). As a consequence, the domestic production of many chlorofluorocarbon refrigerants, solvents, and halon fire suppressants, once thought to be irreplaceable, permanently ceased on January 1, 1994, only 7 years after the Montreal Protocol (see also Breslin, 1999).…”

Sizing the Navy's Strategic Reserve of Ozone‐Depleting Substances

“…The installed charges of refrigerant or halon were available from existing databases and the consumption rates were determined from the procurement analyses. S i c e the average consump tion rate, g, was assumed constant in these analyses for a particular commodity, the gross consumption for a particular year could be represented as: g r o s s consumption = g Z c Skip, octivc (1) The second component of net annual consumption is recovery, or the amount of material recovered from converted or retired systems and sent back to the strategic reserve for future use. In these analyses, the recovery for a particular refrigerant or halon during a particular year was estimated by multiplying the installed charge aboard each converting or retiring ship, c ship, retitr'w or convertittg, by an assumed recovery rate, r, and summing over the entire population of retiring or converting ships that year.…”

“…The Navy understood the importance of determining the Fleet's consumption of OD%. Only by determining the Fleet's consumption would the Navy be able to estab lish a strategic reserve of adequate size to support the Fleet between the point of pre duction cessation and the point at which the last ODSbased system was converted or retired (circa 2050) (1). Ultimately, the Navy used the results of a 1994 Fleet-wide survey to successfully determine the Fleet's consump tion and accurately size a strategic reserve.…”

A Statistical Method for Estimating the Life Expectancy of Certain Shipboard Equipment

“…Prior to production cessation, the Navy realized that it had continuing mission-critical requirements for various ODSs used in the cooling of electronic and weapon systems, fire suppression, and the cleaning of critical systems. In order to ensure continued support for critical systems and applications, the Navy established a strategic reserve of ODSs designed to support the Navy's mission-critical systems until they are retired or converted to alternative technologies (Breslin 1999).…”