News

22 November 2016: Since the Paris Agreement entered into force on 4 November 2016, an additional 12 Parties to the UNFCCC have deposited their instruments of ratification, acceptance, approval or accession to the Paris Agreement, bringing the total number of Parties that have joined the Agreement to 113. The UNFCCC, which is a nearly universal treaty, has 197 Parties.

Heat exchanger, tied to the U-Turn NH₃ separator, to serve growing market for cascade systems.

Ice plant installer Vink sees CO₂ systems as the cheapest available option for light industrial applications like in the fishing sector.

As the UN Climate Change Conference came to a close in Marrakech, after two weeks of inclusive and positive negotiations and hundreds of activities and side-events featuring Heads of State and Government, delegations and participants from around the world, COP22 President Salaheddine Mezouar and Steering committee members held a press conference to take stock on outcomes and achievements.

I was going to call this post “Playing With Fire” but didn’t for obvious reasons. Anyways, in my last post we saw how CO₂ (R744) can be used in both a traditional sub-critical as well as in trans-critical cycles which operate almost backwards to each other. Also, when I typed in trans-critical without the hyphen, Spell Wreck asked me if I meant to type ‘transatlantic’ instead. Um no, but it did remind me of a little bit of history to touch on before we move onto R290. I apologize for the digression but I think you will find it interesting.

The association representing the refrigeration and air conditioning trade in Spain has called for a repeal of the country’s tax on HFCs.

The growing popularity of “natural” refrigerants has prompted A-Gas to add ammonia to its UK product range.

Researchers working for the Montreal Protocol-funded PRAHA project found that R290 air-conditioning has a higher cooling capacity and is more energy efficient than HFCs.

“The use of natural refrigerants [like ammonia] is probably more prevalent in breweries than in most industrial or commercial refrigeration plants,” said Mark Bulmer (global segment manager (cooling), GF Piping Systems) at BrauBeviale an international beverage trade fair taking place in Nuremberg, Germany on 8-10 November.

His campaign statements suggest the EPA’s HFC restrictions could be slowed down, impacting CO₂ uptake, but industry support of the Kigali Amendment could make HFCs a low priority.

Recent changes to the US EPA’s SNAP programme, which will see the phase-out of certain HFCs, will be explained by Emerson in a free webinar later this month.

Chisinau, Republic of Moldova, 10 November 2016 – Heads of national refrigeration assocations and Montreal Protocol focal points from 11 Central Asian and Caucasus countries enhance ozone layer protection and sustainable management of climate gases: The experts shared highlights, challenges and lessons learnt from the implementation of their respective hydrochlorofluoro carbon (HCFC) phase-out strategies and from the surveys on ozone-friendly alternatives during the thematic meeting in Chisinau, Republic of Moldova, 8-10 November 2016.

Hydrocarbons are expected to replace HFCs R404A and R134a in beer fridges the world over.

The Building Engineering Services Association (BESA) is to offer F-gas certification following the CITB announcement that it is to drop its F-gas scheme.

The Swedish transcritical CO₂ supplier sees the U.S. food retail sector turning towards natural refrigerant systems.

Eurocold recently installed a CO₂ system with parallel compression at a Recheio store in Torres Novas, Portugal.

Investigators have so far refused to confirm or deny whether the refrigeration system was the source of yesterday’s fatal ammonia leak at the Carlsberg brewery in Northampton.

A combination of the HFO refrigerant 1234ze and “natural” refrigerant CO₂ is providing all the ac and refrigeration requirements of a retailer in Brno (CZECH REPUBLIC).

The world must urgently and dramatically increase its ambition to cut roughly a further quarter off predicted 2030 global greenhouse emissions and have any chance of minimizing dangerous climate change, UN Environment said today as it released its annual Emissions Gap report.

Propane (R290) boasts superior heat transfer potential than R32, R1234ze and a combination of R32 and R1234ze, according to a recent paper from the University of Padova, Italy.