Since 2004, Venezuela has reduced consumption of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) by 90 percent, reports Osmer Castillo, president of the Industrial Reconversion Fund. These compounds, used in refrigeration, deplete the planet's ozone layer. With four million dollars in its coffers, the Fund “has achieved conversion of 120 companies and trained some 5,000 refrigeration technicians in better use of equipment and tools, and in shifting to ecological or chlorine free gases, like 409-A (for household refrigerators) and 134-A (for vehicles),” Castillo told Tierramérica.

The Fund is completing a timeline that ends in 2010. Its most visible achievement was the 2007 closure of refrigerant factory – one of three in the region; the others were in Argentina and Mexico – in an agreement with the company owners.