Phasedown of Hydrofluorocarbons: Restrictions on the Use of HFCs Under the AIM Act in Variable Refrigerant Flow Air Conditioning Subsector

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY <CFR>40 CFR Part 84</CFR> <DEPDOC>[EPA-HQ-OAR-2021-0643; FRL-11739-01-OAR]</DEPDOC> <SUBJECT>Phasedown of Hydrofluorocarbons: Restrictions on the Use of HFCs Under the AIM Act in Variable Refrigerant Flow Air Conditioning Subsector</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Proposed rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is proposing to amend a provision of the Technology Transitions regulations promulgated under the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act. This action allows one additional year, until January 1, 2027, solely for the installation of new residential and light commercial air conditioning and heat pump variable refrigerant flow systems that are 65,000 British thermal units per hour or greater using components manufactured in the U.S. or imported prior to January 1, 2026. The existing January 1, 2026, compliance date for the installation of certain variable refrigerant flow systems may result in significant stranded inventory that was intended for new construction. EPA is promulgating this action to mitigate the potential for significant stranded inventory in this subsector. </SUM> <DATES> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> Comments must be received on or before July 26, 2024. </DATES> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> You may send comments, identified by Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2021-0643, by any of the following methods: • <E T="03">Federal eRulemaking Portal: https://www.regulations.gov</E> (our preferred method). Follow the online instructions for submitting comments. • <E T="03">Email: a-and-r-docket@epa.gov.</E> Include Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2021-0643 in the subject line of the message. • <E T="03">Mail:</E> U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA Docket Center, Air and Radiation Docket, Mail Code 28221T, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20460. • <E T="03">Hand Delivery or Courier:</E> EPA Docket Center, WJC West Building, Room 3334, 1301 Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20004. The Docket Center's hours of operations are 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m., Monday-Friday (except Federal Holidays). <E T="03">Instructions:</E> All submissions received must include the Docket ID number for this rulemaking. Comments received may be posted without change to <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov,</E> including any personal information provided. Do not submit any information you consider to be Confidential Business Information (CBI) through <E T="03">https://www.regulations.gov.</E> For submission of confidential comments, please work with the person listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. For additional submission methods, the full EPA public comment policy, information about CBI or multimedia submissions, and general guidance on making effective comments, please visit <E T="03">https://www.epa.gov/dockets/commenting-epa-dockets.</E> <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Joshua Silver, Stratospheric Protection Division, Office of Atmospheric Protection (Mail Code 6205A), Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20460; telephone number: (202) 564-2473; email address: <E T="03">silver.joshua@epa.gov.</E> You may also visit EPA's website at <E T="03">https://www.epa.gov/climate-hfcs-reduction</E> for further information. </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> Throughout this document, whenever “we,” “us,” “the Agency,” or “our” is used, we mean EPA. Acronyms that are used in this rulemaking that may be helpful include: <EXTRACT> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">AC—Air Conditioning</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">AHRI—Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">AIM Act—American Innovation and Manufacturing Act of 2020</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">The Alliance—Alliance for Responsible Atmospheric Policy</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">APA—Administrative Procedure Act</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">BTU/h—British thermal units per hour</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">CAA—Clean Air Act</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">EPA—U.S. Environmental Protection Agency</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">FR—Federal Register</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">GWP—Global Warming Potential</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">HARDI—Heating, Air-conditioning & Refrigeration Distributors International</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">HFC—Hydrofluorocarbon</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">OEM—Original Equipment Manufacturer</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">RACHP—Refrigeration, Air Conditioning, and Heat Pumps</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">SNAP—Significant New Alternatives Policy</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">VRF—Variable Refrigerant Flow</FP> <FP SOURCE="FP-1">VRV—Variable Refrigerant Volume</FP> </EXTRACT> <HD SOURCE="HD1">I. General Information</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD2">A. Does this action apply to me?</HD> You may be potentially affected by this proposed rule if you manufacture, import, export, sell or otherwise distribute, or install residential and light commercial air conditioning and heat pump equipment. Potentially affected categories, by North American Industry Classification System code, include: • Plumbing, Heating, and Air Conditioning Contractors (238220). • Air Conditioning and Warm Air Heating Equipment and Commercial and Industrial Refrigeration Equipment Manufacturing (333415). • Plumbing and Heating Equipment and Supplies (Hydronics) Merchant Wholesalers (423720). • Warm Air Heating and Air Conditioning Equipment and Supplies Merchant Wholesalers (423730). This list is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather provides a guide for readers regarding entities that EPA expects could potentially be affected by this action. Other types of entities not listed could also be affected. To determine whether your entity may be affected by this action, you should carefully examine the regulatory text at the end of this document. If you have questions regarding the applicability of this action to a particular entity, consult the person listed in the <E T="02">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT</E> section. <HD SOURCE="HD2">B. What action is the Agency taking?</HD> This proposed rule would provide one additional year, until January 1, 2027, for the installation of new residential and light commercial air conditioning and heat pump systems using variable refrigerant volume (VRV) or variable refrigerant flow (VRF) technology that are 65,000 British thermal units per hour (BTU/h) or larger when using components that were manufactured in the U.S. or imported into the U.S. before January 1, 2026. Specifically, this proposed rule would allow for pre-2026 condensing units, evaporators, and air handlers using R-410A, a blend of two regulated hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) listed in the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act of 2020 (AIM Act), or other regulated substances and blends of regulated substances not meeting the 2023 Technology Transitions Rule's restrictions, to be assembled into new systems ( <E T="03">i.e.,</E> installed), so long as those systems are assembled prior to January 1, 2027. <HD SOURCE="HD2">C. What is the Agency's authority for taking this action?</HD> On December 27, 2020, the AIM Act was enacted as section 103 in Division S, Innovation for the Environment, of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 (codified at 42 U.S.C. 7675). Subsection (k)(1)(A) of the AIM Act provides EPA with the authority to promulgate necessary regulations to carry out EPA's functions under the Act, including its obligations to ensure that the Act's requirements are satisfied. Subsection (k)(1)(C) of the AIM Act also provides that CAA sections 113, 114, 304, and 307 apply to the AIM Act and any regulations EPA promulgates under the AIM Act as though the AIM Act were part of title VI of the CAA. The AIM Act authorizes EPA to address HFCs by providing new authorities in three main areas: phasing down the production and consumption of listed HFCs; managing these HFCs and their substitutes; and facilitating the transition to next-generation technologies by restricting use of these HFCs in the sector or subsectors in which they are used. This rulemaking focuses on the third area: the transition to next-generation technologies by restricting use of these HFCs in the sector or subsectors in which they are used. Subsection (i) of the AIM Act, “Technology Transitions,” provides that “the Administrator may by rule restrict, fully, partially, or on a graduated schedule, the use of a regulated substance in the sector or subsector in which the regulated substance is used.” 42 U.S.C. 7675(i)(1). The AIM Act lists 18 HFCs, and by reference any of their isomers not so listed, that are covered by the statute's provisions, referred to as “regulated substances” under the Act. <SU>1</SU> <FTREF/> (42 U.S.C. 7675(c)(1)). EPA is proposing to amend restrictions on the use of certain HFCs in the residential and light commercial air conditioning and heat pump subsector for large equipment that use VRV or VRF technology. <FTNT> <SU>1</SU>  “Regulated substance” and “HFC” are used interchangeably in this document. </FTNT> <HD SOURCE="HD2">D. What are the incremental costs and benefits of this action?</HD> This proposed rule would reduce regulatory burden associated with the Technology Transitions program while having a negligible environmental impact. Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) have indicated that large quantities of manufactured inventory of VRF equipment could go unsold without an extension of the installation date. Stranding equipment that does not meet the new restrictions is counter to the overall approach EPA has taken in the 2023 Technology Transitions Rule. Extending the installation date for these systems will not have an impact on the benefits modeled in the 2023 Technology Transitions Rule because EPA is limi ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 54k characters. Full document text is stored and available for version comparison. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━