Emissions of the banned chemical CFC-11 were 72 percent higher than before the March 11, 2011, earthquake. "This was surprising to us, because it had been banned in Japan 15 years before the disaster," Saito told Live Science in an email interview. "We had almost forgotten the fact that this ozone-depleting gas still exists around us."About 50 percent of the halocarbon emissions after the earthquake were of HCFC-22. Its concentration rose by 38 percent between February 2011 and March 2012, the study reported. Emissions of HFC-134a and HFC-32 rose by 49 percent and 63 percent compared to the years before the quake.