Behind the headlines


Tough talk averts F-Gas disaster Behind the headlines


News Analysis with B&ES, the Building & Engineering Services Association


Hard lobbying and tough talking during three years of negotia- tions over changes to the Euro- pean F-Gas Regulation averted disaster for small businesses, visitors to last month’s ACR Show heard. During a seminar hosted by the B&ES, leading industry campaigner Graeme Fox said some of the least practical and potentially-damaging proposals for the revised F-Gas Regulation had been stopped in their tracks. However, he warned that there


were still areas of considerable confusion and the danger of unin- tended consequences from the revised legislation, which is ex- pected to be ratified by the Euro- pean Parliament and Council of Ministers before this summer. “The eventual outcome is an


example of how better regula- tion can be delivered when the industry gets together properly to argue for sensible measures,” said Mr Fox, who is president of AREA (Air Conditioning and Re- frigeration European Association) and a former chairman of the B&ES Refrigeration, Air Condi- tioning and Heat Pump Group. He said the industry had


managed to see off the threat of blanket bans on HFC refrigerant gases proposed by the powerful environmental lobby groups in Brussels and had also dissuaded the European Commission from implementing service bans that could have had a catastrophic ef- fect on small high street retailers.


Radical


The phase down of fluorinated gases, such as the HFCs widely used in air conditioning and re- frigeration, will happen, but at a gradual pace that is economically sustainable thanks to the efforts of the industry to rein in some of the more radical proposals from the ‘green lobby’. For example, recycled HFCs will be available for servicing


equipment until 2030, following a ban on new HFC supplies from 2020. This comes in the wake of a complete ban on R22 from 31 December this year. The most important proposal


in the revised Regulation is one imposing a legal duty on whole- salers and distributors to only sell F-gas containing equipment to qualified installers. Online auc- tion sites, in particular, have been giving serious cause for concern and have been stoking the trade in DIY air conditioning installa- tion, which threatens to increase the amount of global warming gas lost into the atmosphere.


small retailers, who use a high global warming potential (GWP) refrigerant like R404A, having to rip out their equipment. The cost to small businesses could have been crippling. Again, the industry lobby man-


aged to get this threshold pushed up to 40 tonnes so the phase down of global warming refriger- ants can now be achieved more gradually and without creating a huge unintended commercial penalty for UK businesses. The new service restriction will come into force in 2020. Mr Fox said there would be confusion about where the


Mr Fox also warned there was a looming problem with Europe’s appetite for forcing the industry to increase its use of so-called ‘natural’ refrigerants. For example, hydrocarbons and CO2 are regarded as a panacea by a number of member states. “The contracting community


“The UK Government has to


work out how it enforces this and gives the Environment Agency the resources to do it, but legally the seller will have to provide a paper trail to show where that gas has gone and who is using it,” said Mr Fox. The previous version of the F- Gas Regulation was full of loop- holes; with one of the most gaping meaning almost all split air conditioning units up to 12kW cooling capacity fell out- side the requirements for leakage checking. This has now been addressed by revising equipment thresholds so they are now based on tonnes of CO2 equivalent rather than kilograms of refrigerant charge. However, a proposal by the


regulator to impose a ban on servicing equipment with a charge over five tonnes CO2 equivalent had to be nipped in the bud. It could have led to


thresholds kick in as it is compli- cated to calculate tonnes of CO2 equivalent. In response, AREA is working on a mobile phone app to help contractors work this out. There will also be a new obli- gation on contractors to provide improved record keeping to their customers, but Mr Fox has doubts about how well this will be implemented. “How many contractors could


say, hand on heart, that they would include a price [in a competitive tender] for preparing a log book knowing full well that their com- petition aren’t?” he asked. “It would be business suicide.” He accepted that UK contrac-


tors should provide better quality information to their clients about recycled and reclaimed refriger- ant gases used in servicing their equipment, but said the issue of who pays has not been addressed and will, therefore, undermine this part of the legislation.


is not ready for widespread working with dangerous flamma- ble gases or massively increased operating pressures,” he told the B&ES seminar. “There is generally not enough knowledge of the inherent dangers…rapid deployment will lead to dangerous, if not catastrophic, incidents in the field. “We have already seen a few cases of fatal explosions where field engineers have been braz- ing pipes that had traces of hy- drocarbon gases still in the oil.” He said the industry argued for mandatory certification as part of the new legislation to ensure contractors were properly trained. However, that was re- moved from the draft legislation during a final round of lobbying. “I’m still unsure why certain


manufacturers were against this proposal. Surely getting certifica- tion for working with alternative gases helps raise skill and knowl- edge levels – so increasing professionalism,” said Mr Fox. “There is also no such thing as


a ‘natural’ gas for refrigeration – they are all produced by commer- cial processes – don’t be fooled by the greenwash on this issue.” He cautioned that there were


significant insurance implications from working with flammable gases – and added that suitable equipment for recovering this type of gas is in short supply. “My biggest concern is that claims in the event of an explosion will be rejected if we use recovery equipment that is not certified for use with flammable gases. “I think it is also inevitable that insurance costs will rise.”


For more information on the B&ES and its members, contact Val O’Reilly on 020 7313 4907 or email val.oreilly@b-es.org 16 | March 2014 | HVR Daily news update at www.heatingandventilating.net


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