Climate-damaging refrigerant gases such as hydrofluorocarbons – more commonly called HFCs – are being phased out, but this has created an opportunity for widescale illegal trade that criminals have been quick to exploit. This chemical black market is worth hundreds of millions of euros a year in lost profits to legitimate suppliers and our investigators found […]
Illegal climate-damaging refrigerant gases worth hundreds of millions of euros a year in lost profits to legitimate suppliers are entering Italy via organised criminal networks, penetrating major supply chains including manufacturing, supermarkets and the state railway. In our new report Fakes, Fraud and F-gases, we reveal the findings of our Climate team’s latest investigations into […]
LONDON: Illegal climate-damaging refrigerant gases worth hundreds of millions of euros a year in lost profits to legitimate suppliers are entering Italy via organised criminal networks, penetrating major supply chains including manufacturing, supermarkets and the state railway. In the new report Fakes, Fraud and F-gases, the London-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) reveals the findings of […]
The European Chemical Agency (ECHA) has published its expert opinions in support of EU-wide restrictions on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS, also known as ‘forever chemicals’), including fluorinated gases. The long-awaited opinions were drawn up by its Risk Assessment Committee (RAC) and Socio-Economic Analysis Committee (SEAC) on the proposed EU universal PFAS restriction. The proposal […]
Last year, authorities in Vietnam indicted a total of 22 defendants for the crimes of smuggling, bribes, fraud and the abuse of public power related to the illegal trade of approximately $71 million worth of timber from January 2021 to January 2024. This case included 13,376 containers of wood veneers made from acacia, eucalyptus, rubberwood […]
Would you feel comfortable feeding your family with food wrapped in plastic made from uncontrolled waste streams? Do we really want children’s toys or baby bottles made from recycled plastic whose chemical history cannot be reliably traced and so might contain ‘forever chemicals’ and other hazardous additives? These are not abstract questions. In the coming […]