A small-business owner friend of mine alerted me to this story, after the air-conditioner repairman hit her with a bill four times higher than her last service call:
As temperatures increase with the onset of spring, so, too, will the cost for repairing and refilling air conditioners with the coolant gas known as Freon.
Northeast Florida air-conditioning contractors have already started to warn customers seeking repairs to brace for a dramatic jump in adding the gas that provides the coolant in air conditioners. Compared to a year ago, the price for putting Freon in a residential or commercial air conditioner will be radically more expensive.
The price jump affects air conditioners that were mainly manufactured before 2010.
“What it means is they have tripled to quadrupled their price on Freon for a service call,” said Tom Karol, a service technician at Don’s Air Conditioning in Jacksonville. “That’s a hell of an expense.”
The jump in Freon costs is the result of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency directive implemented this year. The EPA is phasing out production of the old Freon, known as R-22. That’s because the coolant contained hydrochlorofluorocarbons, which are the gases believed to be eroding the earth’s ozone layer. Instead, the EPA is requiring air conditioning manufacturers to use Freon R-410A, which is a cleaner gas.
That means the price of the old type of Freon has jumped from about $40 per pound to about $90 per pound. A refill of Freon in an air conditioning unit usually takes about 5 to 10 pounds of the gas.
And this should surprise everyone? Why?
I’m sitting here reading this article while listening to an obama “speech of the day from from wonderland”. His solution is government (democrats/liberal/progressives) should control/regulate everything. Capitalism doesn’t work (like socialism ever has). That the republicans don’t care about the people and are the boogeyman. This coming from the boogeyman in chief (on steroids).
Don’t try and confuse liberal / progressives with any facts when they
are pushing an agenda. They rely on Junk Science instead of any form of scientific method.
Didn’t someone disprove the theory that CFCs were hurting the “Ozone Layer”
Thanks
JK
It’s always been very dubious: http://junksciencearchive.com/Ozone/ozone_seasonal.html
Didn’t know there was any freon being manufactured any more. Thought that scam about the ozone layer had been taken care of with new refrigerants under new patents.