For the last year, the HVACR industry has held its breath, waiting to hear whether the U.S. Supreme Court — at the request of Honeywell, Chemours, and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) — would revisit the 2017 decision by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to block the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) ban on HFCs through its Significant New Alternatives Policy (SNAP) program. The Court of Appeals had ruled in favor of Arkema and Mexichem Fluor, which had contended that the program was designed only to address ozone-depleting substances, and while HFCs are suspected of contributing to climate change, they do not deplete the ozone layer.
In October, the Supreme Court decided not to review the case, leaving in place the 2017 ruling, which means for now, the use of high-GWP refrigerants, such as R-404A and R-410A, remains legal. However, that may change, as the EPA is considering a new policy regarding the use of HFCs, and of course, the U.S. could ratify the Kigali Amendment, which calls for a global phasedown of HFCs by more than 80 percent over the next 30 years starting in January 2019. For now, though, the HVACR industry remains in limbo, with end users unsure about which refrigerants will be legal in the future, while states such as California and New York are attempting to pass their own regulations to phase down HFCs.