Big Changes Are Coming to Supermarket Mechanical Rooms
The fastest growing greenhouse gases in California are HFC’s (hydrofluorocarbons). They are used in air conditioners and refrigeration systems to keep things cool and they have an outsized impact on global warming.
California, along with many other regions throughout the world, is implementing regulations to decrease the use of HFC’s and therefore reduce their impact on the environment. Supermarkets need to start adapting.
This was a key message from the NASRC (North American Sustainable Refrigeration Council) Low GWP & Energy Efficiency Expo that I attended earlier this year with 200+ supermarket energy managers and refrigeration technology providers.
How bad are these refrigerants?
If you’re new to the term Global Warming Potential (GWP) as it relates to refrigeration systems, GlobalFact wrote a good whitepaper on the subject. In short, many of the HFC’s used in commercial refrigeration have GWP’s in the thousands - meaning one pound of HFC released into the atmosphere is equivalent to emitting thousands of pounds of carbon dioxide.
For example, R404A, a common refrigerant for supermarkets, has a GWP of 3,922 - this means that leaking one pound of R404A is equivalent to 3,922 lbs of CO2 (about the same global warming impact as burning 440 gallons of gasoline).
Commercial refrigeration systems average about 3,200 lbs of refrigerant, and on average 25% of this charge is leaked each year. That’s equivalent to about 1,600 tons of CO2 annually (3,200lbs x 25% x 4,000lb-CO2e / 2000 lbs per ton). You’d need to plant 2,000 acres of forest to offset those annual emissions (EPA).
Hopefully these two comparisons start to make it clear how large of a climate impact these refrigerants can have if their leakage goes unchecked. It’s why Project Drawdown named Refrigerant Management as the #1 climate mitigation measure.
California takes aim at HFC’s
Because of the outsized impact that HFC’s have on carbon dioxide emissions, when California made a goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030, the state specifically set a target to reduce HFC emissions to 40% below 2013 levels by 2030 (CARB).
To reach this HFC emissions reduction goal, California Air Resources Board (CARB) proposed new low-GWP requirements in California, and supermarkets must start planning. By 2030, supermarkets must either:
Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emission Potential (GHGp) by ~55% below 2018 baseline (note: GHGp = Σ[Refrigerant Charge × Refrigerant GWP]), or
Decrease the weighted-average GWP of their fleet of California stores to below 1,400
In addition, all new stores must have a GWP < 150, which is basically a mandate that they must use CO2, ammonia, propane, or some combination of these as their only refrigerants.
But the solution is expensive
Meeting these requirements is going to cost a lot of money. One option is for supermarket chains to convert roughly half their stores to natural refrigerants (GWP of 1-3), which will cost more than $1,000,000 per system. Alternatively, they may retrofit all of their stores with a refrigerant with GWP <1,400, like R448, which will cost ~$100,000 per system.
There are 21,000 commercial refrigeration systems in California that the CARB requirements have the potential to affect. This implies a minimum of $2.1B ($100,000 x 21,000 stores) in spending required between now and 2030. That’s a lot for an industry that averages 1.5% profit margins.
There are going to be more working groups, info sessions, events, etc. as this all plays out. However, I think it’s fair to say there are some big changes coming in the commercial refrigeration space and supermarkets need to start making plans accordingly.
What does this have to do with Axiom?
I was there to do a “Shark Tank” style presentation on Axiom Cloud's IoT Platform, which applies artificial intelligence to existing commercial refrigeration systems. We unlock a variety of benefits including reducing energy consumption, predicting critical maintenance events, and participating in demand response with utilities.
One feature that has been under development and we are excited to announce is advanced refrigerant leak detection. If the average supermarket leaks 25% and we can reduce the leak rate to 15%, we’ll save nearly 1,000 tons of CO2e per year at an average store. This will also save our customers money on refrigerant charges and reduce energy consumption through more optimal operation.
Taking things a step further to the fleet level, the Platform can help manage the inventory of refrigeration systems and run analyses to help evaluate technologies to utilize at each store such that the fleet of stores meet the CARB requirements by 2030. In many cases, it may be a complex mix of refrigerant swaps and complete system replacements with natural refrigerants in order to meet the requirements. We have the capability to identify what needs to be done and the corresponding financial impact - both from an up front cost perspective and ongoing energy spend.
Interested? Get in touch.
If you want to talk to someone from our team about strategies to reduce your greenhouse gas emissions, track your refrigeration inventory, and more, get in touch with us here.
John is the VP of Sales and Marketing at Axiom Cloud Inc.