Refrigeration manufacturers set for change

As of January 2015 new EU legislation has been introduced to limit the amount of fluorinated greenhouse gases (known as F Gases) available for use in refrigeration manufacturing, the phased step down will run for the next 15 years with the aim being an 80% reduction by 2030.

Most manufacturers are already underway with changes to production and re-training service staff but some, such as Gram and Liebherr were already ahead of legislation as they have solely used hydrocarbon gas in all their refrigeration units for a number of years.

Hoshizaki and Foster have also been offering hydrocarbon options on most of their models for some time now. The focus for these manufacturers is re-developing the small number of products which are yet to be converted to hydrocarbon, currently there is no gas alternative for larger systems such as coldrooms and large capacity ice machines.