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After the London Olympics have issued a “policy presumption against HFCs” and in favour of natural refrigerants at major Olympic sites, and Waitrose announced to use HCs in new branches and refurbs, stories about exploding fridges in the UK have appeared. A mere coincidence?

On 20 August, Construction News reported about the recent decision of the Commission for Sustainable London (CSLondon) 2012 to use natural refrigerants for cooling the Olympic Stadium and the Aquatic Centre sites. Confirmed by CSLondon Chairman Shaun McCarthy, it is now understood that there is a “policy presumption against HFCs”. These were originally thought to be used to cool these buildings. However, after the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) received harsh criticism from CSLondon, also these two major sites are now set to follow the Sustainable Sourcing Code published by the London 2012 Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games.

The decision was made after ODA estimated the carbon footprint of the 2012 Games to be at 3.4 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalents. As a result, CSLondon called for more attention to be paid to HFCs, urging the organisers to issue a firm commitment on these greenhouse gases with a global warming potential thousands of times greater than CO₂. Using them when alternatives exist would send the wrong message, McCarthy confirmed earlier. Although details have not yet been published which natural refrigerants would be used at which sites, the turn-away from HFCs has not passed unnoticed among the industry.

Waitrose’s clear commitment to HCs

Shortly before the London Olympics’s announcement, leading UK food retailer Waitrose pledged to only use propane and propene-based refrigeration technology in new and major refitted branches, starting in 2010. An expected 20% reduction of its carbon footprint convinced the food retailer to choose hydrocarbons as a cheaper, simpler, highly efficient, and safe alternative – the latter often questioned among opponents of hydrocarbons. If followed by other retailers the large-scale entrance of hydrocarbons in supermarket refrigeration could turn out to be another watershed in favour of flammable natural refrigerants, and against existing and new – also flammable – HFCs.

Exploding fridges split the industry

Looking at these recent developments in the UK, one might wonder if the timing of newly appeared articles about hydrocarbon fridges exploding at night has been a mere coincidence. Articles describing the accidents have polarised the industry and widened the gap between opponents and proponents of hydrocarbons. The described incidents have already raised the suspicion of some questioning whether a charge of 150 g of refrigerant in a supposedly sealed unit could lead to the described explosions.

Promoters of hydrocarbon technologies, including environmental group Greenpeace, point to over 350 million HC fridges around the world without any major incident. The German technical association GTZ confirms that, complying with simple safety rules and using proper engineering will render hydrocarbons a most energy-efficient and safe alternative to HCFCs and HFCs in air conditioning. Should all refrigerant flow out at once with a source of ignition present, a short flash flame would occur but no explosion, and the fire would not last long enough to propagate to other combustible materials in the room, experts at GTZ confirm.