Tracking the Fugitives.

When we think about Fugitives, we perhaps think about someone getting away as in the movies. In many cases (not all) we expect the Fugitive to be apprehended and returned. In the movies these Fugitives are tangible characters we can associate with in some sense.

What’s the link here you might ask?

When it comes to emissions (green-house gas emissions that is) we also have Fugitives. These are gases that escape their containment and enter the atmosphere to create global heating along with CO2. There is currently lots of focus on Methane (as there should be) however another area of some concern are the fugitive emissions from refrigeration and cooling systems – that is the escaped refrigerant gas. This is one of the primary areas that we focus on at Veridien.

So how do these “Fugitive” refrigerant gases escape? They escape all along the supply chain – during manufacture, filling and transport, leaks during equipment operation and end-of-life equipment decommissioning. Often it is a small amount lost during each step but also many systems leak during operation – supermarkets are a particularly good example of this and can leak as much as 30% of their refrigerant per year. Also consider a refrigerator that is dumped or dismantled after disposal. You can imagine what happens to the gas inside if it is not processed correctly.

Over the years we’ve seen companies and contractors treat refrigerant like petrol in a car. When it gets low just top it up and go again without any consideration for the climate impact. Once upon a time this might have been acceptable but thankfully the issue is getting more attention. Fugitive emissions from refrigerants are also included under Scope 1 for emissions reporting while the energy consumed is reported under Scope 2.

Consider another example for a moment. We came across a project where a common type of water chiller used for air-conditioning lost 10% of its refrigerant gas through a gradual leak over time. The loss first showed up as a performance degradation where the chiller was consuming more energy than usual.

Putting aside the extra CO2 for energy used for the moment, let’s consider the climate heating impact of the lost refrigerant. The chiller itself contained almost a ton of refrigerant R134a under normal operations. After checking it was found that it was missing 100kg which had likely leaked.

You might think that 10% is not too much to worry about. However consider this – 1kg of R134a is equivalent to 1430kg of CO2 – more than one thousand times more powerful as a greenhouse gas. So our 100kg of leaked refrigerant gas is actually the equivalent of driving over 1 million kilometres in a new passenger car (or driving 30 times around the earth…).

Could this have been prevented – most certainly yes. There are numerous technologies for monitoring and detecting leaks which we can help advise on – these help limit how much refrigerant gas escapes. Fundamental record keeping would have also revealed the problem. Keeping track of how much refrigerant is being ‘topped-up’ for each piece of equipment provides a clear indication if there is a recurring problem that needs to be addressed.

Fugitive gas is not just about the atmosphere. While we believe it is the most important reason, leaking gas also leads to increased expenditure on refrigerant, energy and maintenance plus the safety implications.

Managing refrigerants correctly and installing the right leak management tools to contain refrigerants will always pay for itself.