Refrigerant Sales Restriction: Yes or No?

Yes and No

Most of you are familiar with what’s known as the Refrigerant Sales Restriction. This restriction comes directly from the Environmental Protection Agency and aims at preventing novices and do-it-yourselfers from purchasing and handling refrigerant. By preventing these laymen from handling refrigerants we in theory shrink the amount of refrigerant that is leaked into the atmosphere. … Read more

Supreme Court Turns Down HFC Refrigerant Case

The blows to a national HFC phase down plan just keep coming. It was announced today that the Supreme Court would NOT be reviewing the HFC Refrigerant court case. This appeal to the Supreme Court was the last resort to those companies and organizations who wished to see the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2015 SNAP Rule … Read more

EPA to Remove HFC Refrigerant Leak Regulations

Well folks it has been a hell of a few weeks in the refrigerant industry. The past few months have been rather quiet and then we get all of this news all at once. It always amazes me how fast this stuff can happen. Just a few days ago the Environmental Protection Agency announced that … Read more

States Phasing Down HFCs & The Pricing Impact

United States Climate Alliance

After the past few weeks of various States announcing their plans to phase out HFC refrigerants and the expectation of more States to follow it got me thinking about how these changes will end up affecting the pricing of HFC refrigerants across the country. The worse thing that can happen is for us to fall into … Read more

Maryland & Connecticut Joining HFC Phase Down

United States Climate Alliance

Last week I wrote about New York announcing their plans to phase down HFC refrigerants over the coming years. This announcement came shortly after California finalized their HFC phase down law at the end of last month. Shortly after I wrote that article two more States announced that they would be phasing down HFC refrigerants … Read more

What Are HFC Refrigerants?

What Is It?

HFCs, or HydroFluroCarbons, are a commonly used refrigerant classification used across the globe. Some of the most common HFC refrigerants that you may have heard of are R-134a, R-404A, R-410A, R-125, and R-32. These refrigerants are used in a variety of applications from automotive, to home air conditioners, all the way to industrial refrigeration. In … Read more

New York & California Enforcing HFC Phase Outs

New York

Well ladies and gentlemen like dominoes in a line we now have a second state coming forward with their own HFC refrigerant phase down laws. At the end of last month we had California make their HFC phase down bill become official when their legislate voted in favor on August 30th. This new law known … Read more

When Will R-404A Be Phased Out?

Let me preface this article by saying that this information is as of today, December 14th, 2017. This information may change in the future as it usually does but the facts that I present here are what is known today. In the summer of 2015 the Environmental Protection Agency added a new rule to their … Read more

Honeywell Celebrates 15,000th Supermarket Converting Over to R-407F

Honeywell Refrigerants

The race is on to find suitable alternatives to R-404A. In 2009 the Honeywell corporation invented a new refrigerant called Genetron Performax (R-407F). This new refrigerant is an HFC blend containing forty percent of R-134a, thirty percent of R-125, and thirty percent of R-32. The thinking behind this refrigerant was to come up with a … Read more

2017 Refrigerant Pricing Predictions

Well ladies and gentlemen it’s that time of year again. The time of year when a cold wind blows, the temperature doesn’t rise above thirty degrees, and snow flurries fall from the sky. What better time than now than to talk about refrigerant? It’s the slowest point in the season and it seems that when … Read more

R-452A to Replace R-404A?

R-452A to Replace R-404A

There has been a big push over the past couple years to replace R-404A and other HFC refrigerants with alternatives. The push comes from HFCs having a larger Global Warming Potential, or GWP. GWP is compared against Carbon Dioxide which has a GWP of 1. R-404A has a GWP of 3,943. Obviously, there is quite the difference … Read more

Sneaking HFC Refrigerants into the Montreal Protocol

HFC Refrigerant being added to Montreal Protocol

The Montreal Protocol was a treaty signed way back in 1989 by numerous countries in an attempt to slow down and eventually stop the hole that was forming in the O-Zone layer. It’s main objective was to eliminate the amount of Chlorine and Bromine being released into the atmosphere. This was done by coordinating world … Read more

R-404A Is on the Way Out

ThermoKing Phasing out 404A.

I was reading an article earlier this week that detailed how ThermoKing, a global transport refrigerant manufacturer, was looking for an alternative to the HFC R-404A. The reasoning is the same as for the other HFCs 410A and 134a. It been known for a while that the HFCs have a very high global warming potential … Read more

North America’s Amendment on HFCs

North America Refrigerant Phase Out

In May of 2014 Mexico, Canada, and North America submitted an amendment request on the Montreal Protocol.  The amendment suggested the phase down and eventual phase out of HFC refrigerants for all nations that had signed the Montreal Protocol. The Montreal Protocol is an international treaty that went into effect in January 1st, 1989. The … Read more