Page 39 - Climate Control News Magazine Feb 2021

THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION is currently reviewing the F-gas regulation (517/2014) to achieve its 2030 and 2050 reduced emissions targets.
The European Union must reduce emissions by two-thirds by 2030 compared with 2014 levels. The Commission must explore a 50-50 per cent reduction target for total GHG emissions under the Climate Law Proposal. If the two- thirds reduction is achieved for HFCs and if total GHG emissions are reduced by 40-55 per cent by 2030 then HFC emissions would then contribute
about 1.1-1.5 per cent of the total.
The Commission aims to propose a new F-gas
Regulation by the end of 2021, with proposals to revise policy instruments completed by June, 2021. As part of the F-Gas review, the European Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Contractors’ group AREA has released a position paper call- ing for an extension of the mandatory training and certification scheme to include alternative
refrigerants.
AREA called for mandatory training in the
first F-Gas revision.
“Six years later, AREA’s concerns have unfortu-
nately become reality,” the position paper states. “There are not enough contractors competent on alternative refrigerants to cope with the in- creased demand resulting from the regulation.”
AREA’s stance on extending mandatory train- ing and certification to alternatives has support from other industry bodies as well as the Envi- ronmental Investigation Agency (EIA).
As part of the review the European Commis- sion published a report on a quota system for HFCs last month.
The European Commission building in Brussels.
Natural Refrigerants
F-Gas review to revise emissions target
The findings of this report will serve as input to the review of the EU rules on fluorinated greenhouse gases.
The report found that there is currently no shortage of HFCs on the Union market, as a tech- nology shift to lower global warming alterna- tives is ongoing and many such alternatives are available in sufficient volumes.
“Prices have come down from their peak in 2018 but innovation continues to bring new tech- nologies to the market, in particular because more ambitious phase-down steps are in place,” the report said.
“The reasons for declining prices from the 2018 peak include the successful transition to al- ternatives in some important sectors, better leakage prevention and higher reclamation rates, stock building in 2017 to prepare for the 2018 phase-down step, and the change of tradi- tional supply chains.
“It will be important to closely continue monitoring the market and gas prices going forward, as well as effectively prevent any ille- gal activities, in particular as another phase- down step (to 45 per cent of the 2015 baseline) is foreseen for 2021.” ✺
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CLIMATE CONTROL NEWS FEBRUARY 2021
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