California to regulate refrigerant emissions from large facilities 

As of 2011, large facilities such as supermarkets and cold storage warehouses in California that use refrigerants other than CO₂ or ammonia will be subject to refrigerant leak inspection, repairs, required service practices and record keeping requirements. 

Following a lengthy stakeholder process, the California Air Resources Board (CARB) yesterday adopted the first in the US comprehensive regulation to reduce high-GWP refrigerant gas emissions from commercial and industrial refrigeration systems.

Starting in 2011, the new rule implies compliance costs for all large facilities using refrigerants other than ammonia or CO₂. Nonetheless, CARB expects that the leak detection, monitoring and repair requirements will reduce the need to buy costly refrigerant to refill systems, thus leading to average savings of about two dollars a metric ton CO₂ equivalent reduced. Moreover, the rule is estimated to lead to emission reductions of 8.1 million metric tons CO₂e in 2020, emissions equivalent to those associated with the energy used by 1.5 million homes per year.

Types of facilities affected by the rule

The new rule focuses on large refrigeration systems using more than 50 pounds of CFC, HCFC or HFC refrigerant. Therefore, it will generally apply to facilities such as:

• Supermarket and grocery stores
• Food and beverage processors
• Cold storage warehouses
• Industrial process cooling plants

The rule will not apply to systems using CO₂ or ammonia refrigerant and will generally not affect smaller businesses (bars, restaurants, gas stations) of office buildings.

The requirements for facilities using refrigerants other than CO₂ or NH3

As of 2011, the new rule will require leak inspection, repairs, required service practices and record keeping. Depending on the type and size of refrigeration systems, leak inspection requirements will vary from continuous leak monitoring to quarterly or annual leak inspections. Refrigerant leaks will have to be repaired by a U.S. EPA certified technician within 14 days of leak detection, while in cases where systems cannot be repaired, a retrofit or retirement plan will be required.

Background

The tracking, reporting, recovery, and replacement of high-GWP refrigerants in stationary is the subject of several “early action measures” under the California Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (AB 32). The state-wide landmark law targets a cut in carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, in total around 170 million metric tons of CO₂ equivalents.