New Year, New Refrigerants: Updates on the Refrigerant Phase-out
The new year has come and passed and 2025 is in full swing! This also means the next stage of the HFC refrigerant phase-out is here, so let’s review what that means for us architects, engineers, and contractors. The American Innovation and Manufacturing (AIM) Act, passed in 2020, gives the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the authority to regulate and phase down the production and use of hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants. HFCs are known greenhouse gases, most of which are rated with a global warming potential (GWP) several thousand times that of carbon dioxide (which is the baseline of the scale, with a GWP of 1). The EPA has thus banned HFCs by setting limits to the allowable GWP of refrigerants manufactured or imported for use in the U.S. To Implement this ban, the EPA has implemented phase-out dates for the manufacturing and installation of different types of HVAC equipment, see below: This means that the DX and Heat Pump equipment that we select and specify on our projects (other than VRF) can no longer be manufactured or imported with R-410A refrigerant. Going forward we must design and specify DX and Heat Pump equipment with refrigerants that meet the GWP limitations set by the EPA, which will mostly be R-454B and R-32 in our industry. With the shift to the newest refrigerants, one of our biggest restrictions as the selecting and specifying engineers over the past several months has been the ability to actually select the equipment with the new refrigerants and attain the refrigerant charges, equipment capacities, and efficiency ratings. Over the last month, a majority of manufacturers have confirmed the availability to select equipment with the new refrigerants, which allows us to finalize equipment selections and calculations. While there are still some minor restrictions in the availability of equipment specifics as the manufacturers continue to get the new equipment tested, the major equipment information is mostly available to move forward with selections. In summary, the new refrigerant changes are upon us and will require additional calculations and coordination for DX systems that should be considered for projects in various stages of design and construction. The equipment manufacturers have made big strides to provide us, as the engineers, the information we need to get equipment selections, but there may be some minor lagging information we may need to wait for confirmation on. Overall, 360 Engineering is excited to move away from the limbo between two refrigerant types and start moving toward a more sustainable future.