Air Date: Week of March 16, 2001

Transcript

SOLOMON-GREENBAUM: The high-tech industry is often thought of as white glove clean. But making the chips to run computers produces millions of tons of chemicals call perfluorocompounds, or PFCs. The Environmental Protection Agency calls PFCs the most potent and persistent of all global warming gases. And now, leading computer chip makers are volunteering to reduce their emissions of the chemicals. The Semi-Conductor Industry Association pledged to cut PFCs by ten percent below 1995 levels before the end of the decade. The EPA says this would be similar in effect to taking 12 million cars off the road. U.S. companies produce more than half the world's computer chips. Manufacturers in Asia and Europe have also committed to reduce their output of the chemicals. That's this week's business update. I'm Anna Solomon-Greenbaum.

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