The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed loosening a rule phasing down the use of hydrofluoroca
rbons, or HFCs, highly potent greenhouse gases used in refrigerators and air conditioners.
The Tuesday proposal comes in response to concerns “about the lack of availability of refrigerant alternatives during hot summer months and reg
ulations that increase the cost of living for families,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin said in a statement.
The Trump administration is looking to extend deadlinesto comply with rules to switch to cleaner refrigeran
ts. The EPA proposal applies to everything from residential air conditioning to retail food refrige
ration and semiconductor manufacturing. The agency also wants to allow certain equipment, including cold stor
ge used in warehouses, to use higher amounts of the more polluting chemicals.
In 2020, President Trump signed the law requiring the EPA to regulate the super pollutants, and the Biden admin
istration finalized the regulation now being targeted with this
recent proposal. “Control of HFCs has been one of the few areas of bipartisan agreement,” Michael Gerrard, fa
culty director of Columbia University’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, said in an email.
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David Doniger, senior attorney and strategist for the Natural Resou
rces Defense Council, said the proposal would worsen the climate cr
isis by not only allowing HFC use for longer, but in larger amounts for s
ome equipment. “They are also proposing to weaken the rules even after the delay,” he said.
The Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute (AHRI) expressed support for the existing 2023 rule
s. It said in a press release that delaying some of the rule transition dates,
as the EPA is proposing, “would disrupt multi-year planning and investment by US manufacturers” at a time when “com
panies have already retooled production, certified new equipment, and built supply chains around the current schedule.”
The Food Industry Association, meanwhile, applauded the move. “We thank EPA for recognizing the need to find a way to achieve the agency’s goals
while not overburdening the economy,” president and chief executive officer Leslie Sarasin said in a statement.
This proposal will soon be published in the Federal Register, after which there will be a 45-day public comment period.