Big Changes For HVAC In 2025 

There are changes coming to refrigerant very soon, and we want to ensure our customers are educated on these changes and what that means for you, the consumer.

Read the sources:

Rheem

Carrier

Don't want to know all the ins and outs? Here is a quick summary: 

The liquid inside your air conditioner is called refrigerant. This liquid has different chemical make ups and HVAC equipment is designed to operate on a certain type of refrigerant. The type of refrigerant used in the industry changes over time for a number of reasons. It is changing again and this causes the cost of equipment to go up. We are unsure how much the cost of equipment will increase, not even our suppliers know, but we feel it is our responsibility to inform our customers of the changes. 

What Is Refrigerant? 

Refrigerant is a chemical compound capable of transitioning from liquid to gas and back again. During the process, its abilities to absorb and transfer heat have been the key to cooling, refrigeration and heat pump systems for many years.

Historically, refrigerant has been manufactured using a number of different chemical combinations. Some of the most commonly recognized names of refrigerant include:

Freon®

R-12

R-22

R-134a 

R-410a 

Puron®

The EPA is the governing body that changes the refrigerant based on changes in science, environmental factors and more. 

What Does It Do? 

As a part of your air conditioner or heat pump system, it helps transfer heat and humidity out of your home for cooling... or draws heat from outdoor air and brings it inside for heating. That is why some units are basic air conditioners and some are heat pumps that use the out door unit for both heating and cooling. 

What It Means To The Consumer? 

Because many of the formulations of refrigerant, including R-22, contained ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), production of equipment that uses R-22 effectively ended in January of 2010. More recent blends such as R-410a refrigerant have been approved and listed by the U.S. EPA as acceptable alternatives for R-22. 

If you have a system from before 2010 you likely have a system with R-22 refrigerant.

Use of R-22 is phased out, so prices for re-charging a system with R-22 have dramatically risen. As of 2020, no new R-22 will be available. Only “used” or “reclaimed” R-22 will be available for system repairs/recharging. Due to potentially escalating costs for repairs, it may be more economically sound to replace an ailing air conditioner or heat pump with a new model that uses R-410a refrigerant. This same thing will happen next year with R-410a as we move to R-54b.

What Is Changing About R-410a? 

Time has come for R-410a to be phased out much like R-22 was. It is being replaced with R-54b. This means that equipment that is suited for R-410a will stop being produced as of January of 2025. What does this mean for you, the consumer? 

The cost of equipment will go up for the manufacture, the distributer and finally you the customer. IIt is estimated to be a 20-30% increase in cost. We feel like it is our responsibility to inform our customers. 

The new equipment for R-54b has been projected to start manufacturing at the end of this year and we will see the move to the new equipment January of 2025. 

The requirements from the EPA differ depending on the region you are in, Idaho is classified in the Northern region. For the states in the North region, compliance is based on date of manufacture. Therefore, if a product, as part of an AHRI-rated matched system, was compliant on the day it was produced, it can continue to be sold and installed anywhere in the North region.

We know this is a lot of information and can be hard to understand, but we know our customers deserve to know about big changes like these, that will directly affect them.