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Refrigerant Rule Expected in '12

ATLANTA — The Environmental Protection Agency is targeting mid-2012 as the earliest point at which a proposed amendment to Section 608 of the Clean Air Act — which regulates leak repair for commercial refrigeration — would take effect, said Keilly Witman, manager of the EPA’s GreenChill Partnership.

ATLANTA — The Environmental Protection Agency is targeting mid-2012 as the earliest point at which a proposed amendment to Section 608 of the Clean Air Act — which regulates leak repair for commercial refrigeration — would take effect, said Keilly Witman, manager of the EPA’s GreenChill Partnership.

The proposal, announced last December, would lower the leak repair “trigger rate” — when retailers are required to fix refrigerant leaks — from a 35% annual leak rate to 20%. The food retailing industry has submitted comments to the proposal, and the EPA is now responding to those comments and developing the final rule. It will then be subjected to a broader review by the EPA and other federal agencies before being published in the Federal Registry and taking effect.

Speaking last month at the Food Marketing Institute’s Energy & Store Development Conference here, Witman invited retailers to contact her for updates on the rule, acknowledging that “a lot of people are nervous about when this is going to hit.” She noted that stores will have “a certain amount of time” to make any changes in their refrigeration systems after the rule is published.

Another change in EPA’s refrigeration regulations is the acceptance of hydrocarbons such as propane (R-290) as a refrigerant in self-contained cases. Hydrocarbons have been vetted for health and safety by the EPA and in September were submitted for final approval to the Office of Management and Budget. Witman expects the industry to get the go-ahead to use hydrocarbon refrigerants by early 2012.