The Hindu Business Line : New facility to efficiently manage use of Halons

THE Government has announced that it would set up National Halon Reclamation and Banking Facility, which will pool the ozone-depleting agent and efficiently manage the use of Halons only for essential purposes.

Halons are a group of compounds used primarily in fire extinguishers. India began phasing out Halons from 1992 onwards by replacing them with alternative substances after the country became a party to the Montreal Protocol in 1990.

The banking facility, to be inaugurated by the Union Minister of Environment and Forests, Mr A. Raja, on August 31, will be set up with the help of Australia and Canada. It would also enable old Halons stored in cylinders, which has developed impurities to be purified and reused.

This fire-extinguishing agent is preferred for areas such as electronic installations (power house control rooms, computer rooms, telephone exchanges and archives) where no secondary damages can be tolerated. It is also essential for uses involving weight penalty such as aircraft and where space is a premium such as military vehicles, ships, submarines and oil platforms.

"All Halon-based fire extinguishers and fixed fire protection systems are now controlled and limited to critical uses in India," said an official release.

Production of Halon has "reduced from 750 tonne per annum in 1991 to almost nil in 2004 and no new Halon-based fire extinguishing equipmentare now being produced," it added.

Halons are now not produced in India, as stipulated under the Montreal Protocol. Exports and imports are allowed only for recycled Halons, said the Government.

The main objectives of the facility being inaugurated include preparing a comprehensive database of Halon-1211 and Halon-1301 (specific types of Halon) kept in stock by some of the large users such as the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, National Thermal Power Corporation, among others in the country; to establish laboratory and other facilities for purification and reclamation of Halons kept in stock for a long time; to prepare educational materials for training of Halon users for better management of Halons in their stock; and to establish a panel of experts to determine the essential use of banked Halon.