Market & technology trends for CO2 and ammonia in commercial and industrial refrigeration.

The changing legislative landscape for fluorinated refrigerants is underpinning the market trends for natural refrigerants in various sectors globally. With an increasing uptake of HFC-free technologies there is a growing competition between different natural refrigerant-based systems. While ammonia has been widely used as the standard refrigerant in large industrial refrigeration for more than a century, new technologies using low-charge ammonia and CO2 challenge the status quo. With more than 16,000 CO2 transcritical stores in Europe and close to 20,000 globally, CO2 transcritical technology is gradually gaining ground in different parts of the world. At the same time, low-charge ammonia represents the leading disruption in the traditional industrial refrigeration market. This new technology is also leading to ammonia being considered for application where it has traditionally not been used, such as HVAC and food retail. The paper evaluates the key market, technology and policy trends for CO2 and ammonia, presenting data on the number of installed applications and comparing the evolution in Europe, North America and Asia / Pacific.