Product Stewardship submission to MfE

PSO SUBMISSION TO MFE

The Ministry for the Environment – Manatū Mō Te Taiao is seeking feedback on proposed measures to reduce the environmental impact of fluorinated gases (Fgases). F-gases are potent greenhouse gases, with global warming potential hundreds or thousands of times greater than carbon dioxide.

In New Zealand, F-gases are mostly hydrofluorocarbons used as refrigerants and are found in a range of products such as heat pumps, dehumidifiers, vehicles, fridges and freezers.

OUR SUBMISSION

In the November IRHACE Journal, the industry associations released what they have been doing for the HVAC&R in dustry. Read here https://www.cccanz.org.nz/news/164/35/The-Invisible-Elephant-in-the-Climate-Change-Room/

The industry organisations collectively represent the bulk of the HVAC&R industry, and we believe the current scheme “Recovery now calling itself Cold Safe” fails the government’s expectation that the product stewardship is end-to-end. To that end we are making our own Product Stewardship Scheme (PSS) application.

WHAT ARE WE AS AN INDUSTRY DOING TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM

The industry associations with SmartTrade have developed an Ethereum based blockchain end-to-end refrigerant management solution to help mitigate the global warming impact of refrigerants. This has gone through to proof of concept and the key benefit of a blockchain solution is it will provide massively increased visibility throughout the refrigerant supply chain.

The primary goal is to manage the F-gases, the DIRECT emissions problem. It will be able to manage all refrigerant types helping to reduce the INDIRECT emissions problem, the so called “energy penalty” at the power stations.

There is going to be a raft of complementary applications to work alongside the blockchain solution. SmartForms include a HVAC&R maintenance and refrigerant and technical licensing along with workplace safety management solutions.

Workplace safety is a key component of the wider solution we are working on alongside technical education and training.

Our key partners involved in the application namely Climate Control Companies Association of New Zealand (CCCANZ), Refrigerant License New Zealand (RLNZ) and the Institute of Refrigeration, Heating and Air Conditioning Engineers of New Zealand (IRHACE) as well as wholesalers Actrol, RefSpecs, Cooling Equipment, RealCold and Patton.

We need your business support. It could be as simple as keeping informed or you might want to give us some feed back or even get directly involved in the project.

Read the full article in the Industry Journal, December 2022