Partnership Accomplishments
Each year GreenChill Partner companies share data on the amount of refrigerant contained in their systems and the amount of refrigerant leaked from those systems. These data demonstrate that GreenChill Partners generate environmental and economic benefits by transitioning to environmentally friendlier refrigerants, reducing the amount of refrigerant used by stores, eliminating refrigerant leaks, adopting green refrigeration technologies, and implementing environmental best practices.
Refrigerant Types Using Less Refrigerant Reducing Emissions Saving Money
GreenChill Partners are transitioning away from refrigerants that deplete the ozone layer and have high global warming potentials
Installed refrigerants over time reflect best practices
GreenChill Partners have transitioned away from using ozone-depleting refrigerants like hydrochlorofluorocarbon (HCFC)-22 in commercial refrigeration systems. More recently, Partners are using more refrigerants that have lower-global warming potentials (GWPs).
Average global warming potential per pound of installed refrigerant has been decreasing since 2015
After the initial implementation of the Montreal Protocol in the 1990s, many sectors, including commercial refrigeration, moved to the first available alternatives. These alternatives contained zero ozone depletion potential, but had high global warming potentials. Since then, chemical producers, including many GreenChill Partners, have created alternative refrigerants with lower global warming potentials so that food retailers can reduce their impact on both the ozone layer and climate change. With the adoption of these alternatives, the average global warming potential per pound of refrigerant installed by Partners has been declining since 2015.
Lower-global warming potential refrigerants are being installed in commercial systems
Partners' use of lower-global warming potential refrigerants has increased considerably between 2013 and 2023. For commercial refrigeration systems, the chart below shows growth in the use of refrigerants with global warming potentials several thousand times lower than many common refrigerants.
GreenChill Partners are using less refrigerant in their stores
Average amount of installed refrigerants per store is decreasing
GreenChill Partners are reducing the amount of refrigerant contained in their stores' systems. Compared to 2007, GreenChill Partner stores in 2023 had an average of 921 fewer pounds of refrigerant in their refrigeration systems.
GreenChill Partners are reducing refrigerant emissions
Average emissions per store are decreasing
GreenChill Partners work to ensure that refrigeration systems stay leak-tight, and that no refrigerant is emitted. The average amount of refrigerant emitted from refrigeration systems by an average Partner store dropped from 411 pounds in 2007 to 298 pounds in 2023.
Average Partnership refrigeration emissions rate remains low
GreenChill Partners maintain an average emissions rate that is much lower than estimated industry average.
GreenChill Partners are saving money
GreenChill Partners are saving on refrigerant replacement costs
GreenChill Partners' efforts to reduce emissions and transition to environmentally friendlier refrigerants are saving their companies money. By maintaining low emissions rates, GreenChill Partners avoid purchasing replacement refrigerant with an estimated annual value of $899 million between 2013 and 2023. In 2023, Partners avoided $134 million in replacement costs.