🚨Industry Perspective: Board Member Spotlight Blog #1
The refrigerant transition is one of the most urgent but overlooked climate challenges, invisible to most, yet critical to cooling, heating, and net-zero goals. Ahead of #ClimateWeekNYC, we’re featuring Mike Armstrong, President of A-Gas Americas, on how bold policy and industry investment can scale reclamation and secure long-term refrigerant supply.
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🏢 Balancing Policy Tools
Q: From an industry leader’s standpoint, how can policymakers best balance regulations and incentives to accelerate adoption of low-GWP alternatives and expand refrigerant recovery?
A: With the pending policy changes coming from the federal government over the next year, it’s only a matter of time before the unintended consequences are refrigerant shortages. This is even being picked up on now by the federal government and industry itself. So, to some extent, any policy that is focused on action now, is a good policy.
And there are plenty of examples of good policies out there that support both the regulatory and incentivized concepts; California probably provides us with our best example. And New York, with a similar program, is not too far behind. State policymakers should simply look at those programs as a guide for their immediate action.
A key tenant of any regulation is to support the concept of the “right to service” which allows business owners and homeowners the ability service equipment to the end of their useful lives. Both California and New York have implemented programs that will drive refrigerant recovery and support the use of reclaimed refrigerants. These programs reduce our reliance on the supply of refrigerants, which will reduce dramatically in 2029.
I also believe that we need continued incentives to move towards lower-GWP alternatives. In the end, system changes are expensive for business owners and homeowners, and they will need help from local governments, industry, and the financial community to provide resource support in this space. The California FRIP program is a nice start to incentivizing refrigerant transitions for businesses and has been running strong for the past 2 years. In fact, they are expanding that to include a pilot for residential AC, so they really are covering all sectors in a creative manner.
In the end, local governments need to determine how much they are willing to invest to make these various programs a reality. But the final message is clear. Start acting now to put programs in place to ensure long term and cost-effective refrigerant supply for your constituents.
♻️ Scaling Reclamation
Q: In your role at A-Gas, how do you see commercialization—especially the scaling of recovery and reclamation—interacting with, or even driving, refrigerant policy development?
A: Its a tale of two cities really. In the end you need reclaimers to produce certified reclaimed material, and you need businesses who are willing to purchase those certified reclaimed refrigerants to support further market growth.
The good news is that HFC reclamation in the United States has experienced record growth over the past three years. State level programs, primarily in California, have contributed to this growth by sending the necessary demand signals through their markets to require the purchase of certified reclaimed materials, which enable contactors to secure more gases and send to reclaimers for the reclamation process. We saw this with the R4 program in California for R-410A from 2023-2025 and are starting to see demand activity for future programs in California, Washington, and New York. We are even now seeing large businesses across the country starting their own refrigerant conservation programs, often securing quantities of gases to support their projected future needs, particularly when the next phasedown hits in 2029.
The bad news is that the demand for certified reclaimed refrigerants peaks quickly in 2029 and 2030 driven by federal and state refrigerant management requirements. And the support mechanisms to support that type of reclaimed refrigerant capacity growth are just not available in the current policies currently in law. We need to collectively expand reclaimed refrigerant capacity by 300% to 400% the most recent levels from 2024. This will require hundreds of millions of dollars in plant investment, people, training, and ancillary equipment (cylinders, recovery equipment, etc). But it will save Americans billions of dollars in unnecessary replacement costs of their refrigeration and air conditioning equipment.
Which policy instruments do you think are most effective at creating strong demand signals for reclaim (e.g., virgin sales restrictions, tied incentives, procurement standards, EPR laws)?
By far the best way to create strong demand signals for reclaim is to mandate the use of reclaim in specific sectors or applications. But the reality is that we’re at a point where every policy instrument has a place at the table. To make a meaningful and lasting impact on the environment, multiple mechanisms need to be put in place to ensure we protect and enhance it for a sustainable future. Furthermore, what may work well in California may not work well in Maine, so each state needs to look at its own needs and market drivers to enact the most effective policy for all of its constituents. That said, no matter the state, it’s clear that financial incentives for those who are in the field and on the first line of defense for the environment make an impact.
No matter what policy instruments are selected, policy makers must include reporting requirements to ensure compliance and accountability to policy and standards. While their program has not officially kicked off yet, New York has the aspiration for strong reporting and compliance requirements and now just needs to execute well. California delivered a strong compliance message with its R4 program as well. And these reporting requirements are reasonable, reflect data that must be captured currently, with many commercially available tools to make reporting very easy.
📊 Building Confidence in Reclaim
Q: What do you see as the biggest barriers or misconceptions around reclaimed refrigerants among end-users and service providers—and how can we build greater confidence in their quality, safety, and reliability?
A: Some people still think reclaimed refrigerants are different from virgin gas from a quality, safety, and reliability perspective. By law, reclaimed gas must meet strict quality and purity standards—AHRI-700 states 99.5% purity—so they both provide the same required performance standards from the OEMs, most of whom are members of AHRI. Perhaps more unfortunate is that people think “recycled” and “reclaimed” refrigerants are the same. That could not be further from the truth. Reclaimed refrigerants have those set purity and quality standards, while recycled refrigerants do not. Using the correct terminology is important here. No matter what the case, ensure that any refrigerant that you are purchasing meets the minimum purity requirement of AHRI-700. It’s good for your equipment, and it’s now required under federal law.
The service sector has been using certified reclaimed refrigerants for more than 20 years with confidence. Where we need more focus and support is from the OEM community.
OEMs, particularly those with in house service teams, are among the best companies in the world, when it comes to recovering gases from their equipment. They have world class refrigerant management experience and excel here at scale and globally. However, at the same time they do a have a preference to use virgin gases over reclaim gases in their original charged equipment, at least in the United States. Reasons vary, but largely there isn’t enough reclaim refrigerant support OEM demand here, and virgin product is cheaper.
But we are seeing a few of the largest OEMs take the leadership reins by using reclaimed refrigerants. In Europe for example, refrigerant supply is quite limited, and in response some OEMs have changed entire lines over to used reclaimed refrigerants. They have great quality programs which are resulting in zero customers complaints related to refrigerant quality. I expect other OEMs will follow suit over time, but it takes leadership, commitment, planning and execution.
Looking at current U.S. policies such as the AIM Act, where are they working well, and what changes or actions are still needed to enable broader scaling of refrigerant lifecycle management?
We are very much at a transition point at this time with the AIM Act and it’s difficult to predict what the outcome will be. What is clear to most stakeholders is that there will be refrigerant shortages much earlier than expected as a result of some of the anticipated implementation delays, particularly with the Technology Transition section of the AIM Act. Shortages are not good for anybody. If there is not sufficient supply of refrigerants at the federal level, it will force a second Technology Transition, where we have to set GWP targets even lower than they are today, and that’s not good for businesses, homeowners, and taxpayers.
There is still a lot of ground to cover here, and I think that state level action for accelerated refrigerant management and good dialogue at the federal level will support a reasonable outcome for all parties.
🔑 Looking Ahead
Q: What infrastructure gaps still exist in the U.S. to support large-scale refrigerant reclamation? For example, are there challenges around transportation, facility storage capacity, or ensuring consistent availability of supply?
A: It is really about timing, bringing this capacity on-line in a gradual and sustained timeline from now until 2029, in order to meet that massive reclaim demand requirement in 2029 and 2030. The sequencing is not quite aligned yet with the AIM Act, but State level programs are starting to fill the gap.
Massive investment infrastructure is needed between 2026-2028 to close the reclaim gap. Interestingly enough, every company in the United States that is actively participating in reclamation is a small business, so they will all need support to raise the necessary capital for this expansion.
The technology that is required to support this growth all exists today in one form or another, and reclaimers continue to innovate to safely handle the refrigerants of the future.
Another key support mechanism is through customers who need refrigerants. Investing in relationships with quality reclaimers now will only help their businesses in the future. When customers plan their refrigerant requirements in the future, it makes availability of supply that much easier.