Why the refrigerant is a financial decision
Refrigerant choice reads like an engineering detail. It isn't. It sets three numbers your accountant will live with for fifteen years: the energy bill, the service bill, and the regulatory risk on the asset itself. Commercial systems leak — 8–15% of charge a year is typical — so you keep buying the gas you chose, at whatever it costs by then.
Three families, fairly compared
| HFCs (R410A, R404A, R134a, R32) | R290 (propane) | CO₂ (R744) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| GWP | 675 – 3,922. A kilo of leaked R404A ≈ nearly 4 tonnes of CO₂. | 3 | 1 |
| Service gas price | High and rising — R404A ≈ ₱1,400/kg today, with the phasedown tightening supply. | Low — an abundant industrial gas. | ≈ ₱50/kg. The cheapest refrigerant there is. |
| Best at | General HVAC where it already dominates. | Heat pumps & hot water to ~75 °C — top efficiency in tropical heat. | Refrigeration & freezing to −40 °C, plus high-temp heat to ~130 °C; rejects 65–75 °C water free. |
| Safety class | Mostly A1 non-flammable (R32 is A2L). | A3 — flammable; engineered with small sealed charges (<1 kg) outdoors, to IEC 60335-2-40 / EN 378. | Non-flammable, non-toxic; runs at high pressure — needs competent design. |
| Regulatory future | Phasedown in law (DAO 2021-31, Kigali schedule). The R22 precedent: service prices rose 5–10× as supply tightened. | No phasedown clock. | No phasedown clock. |
| PFAS / forever-chemical risk | Yes — common HFC/HFO breakdown products are PFAS that accumulate permanently. Full story. | None. Breaks down to CO₂ and water. | None. |
| Upfront cost & familiarity | Wins. Cheapest kit, every installer knows it, parts everywhere. | Moderate; needs trained installers. | Highest — pressure-rated components and specialist design. |
Where HFCs honestly win: upfront price and universal familiarity. If you're certain the system will be replaced within a few years anyway, the cheap R410A unit can still be the rational buy. The trap is the fifteen-year asset bought today on a gas whose most expensive service years arrive mid-life.
The running-cost story in one cold store
This is where the families separate in pesos, not principles. An older R404A cold-store plant typically loses money three ways at once: refrigerant top-ups at ₱1,400/kg, electric defrost heaters fighting the freezer five times a day, and efficiency quietly degraded by non-condensable gases. At a typical mid-size facility that adds to around ₱4.1 million a year — before anyone looks at the tariff. A CO₂ plant with passive defrost removes all three, with paybacks under two years, and rejects 65–75 °C water free for washdown. The full breakdown is here.
What Karnot builds — and why
Karnot Energy Solutions Inc., based in Mapandan, Pangasinan, builds on natural refrigerants only: iHEAT R290 heat pumps for hot water and process heat, and iCOOL CO₂ systems for refrigeration and high-temperature duties, serving the Philippines, the UK, the US and Canada. Not for sentiment — because GWP 1–3, cheap service gas and no phasedown clock is simply the better fifteen-year deal. The technical data lives in our refrigerant properties tool.
Questions we get asked
What's the GWP difference, in plain terms?
R290 scores 3, CO₂ scores 1. The HFCs they replace score 675 to 3,922 — a kilo of leaked R404A has the climate impact of nearly four tonnes of CO₂.
Is CO₂ really cheaper to run than R404A?
Over the plant's life, substantially: ₱50/kg vs ₱1,400/kg for the gas you'll keep replacing, plus the defrost and efficiency penalties a modern CO₂ plant removes — around ₱4.1 million a year at a typical mid-size facility.
Is R290 propane safe?
Yes, engineered properly: non-toxic, small sealed charges under 1 kg, outdoor units, IEC 60335-2-40 and EN 378 design. The full safety explainer is here.
Will HFCs be phased out here?
The phasedown is already law (DAO 2021-31, following the Kigali schedule). The R22 precedent saw service prices rise 5–10× as supply tightened.
Where do HFCs still win?
Upfront price and familiarity. Short-horizon systems can still rationally be HFC — we'll tell you when that's true for your case.
Specifying a system this year?
Send us the duty — temperatures, loads, site — and we'll give you the honest three-way numbers for your case, including when the answer isn't ours.
Talk to an engineerRelated: The forever-chemical problem in HFCs · Where a cold store's money leaks · Refrigerant properties tool · iCOOL CO₂ · iHEAT R290