World’s largest convenience retailer adopts lower GWP refrigerant alternative

Honeywell and 7-Eleven Inc. have announced the adoption of Honeywell Solstice N40 (R-448A) refrigerant as 7-Eleven’s standard for remote condensers supporting its refrigeration cases installed across Canada and the United States.

7-Eleven also selected Honeywell’s lower global warming potential (GWP) alternative for retail refrigeration in Japan last year, becoming the first leading retail chain in the country to adopt the refrigerant.

The convenience retailer set measurable corporate social responsibility (CSR) goals in 2016 to reduce its environmental footprint. The company’s CSR mission has three focus areas – planet, products and people. Using 2015 as a baseline, 7-Eleven committed to continuing to reduce its carbon footprint and increase community engagement in the U.S. and Canada by concentrating on energy, packaging and philanthropy.

It aims to reduce its energy footprint in stores by 20 per cent by 2027.

“In the past few years, we’ve implemented several innovative measures, such as LED lighting, energy management systems, wind energy in select stores and high-efficiency HVAC units to reduce our CO2 emissions,” said Ann Scott, 7-Eleven director of energy, engineering and store planning. “The use of Solstice N40 is an environmentally preferable alternative for 7-Eleven. Joining forces with Honeywell, which also embraces a mindset and goal to serve as environmental stewards, was a natural fit.”

“7-Eleven has responsibly elected to adopt Solstice N40 to help lower their carbon footprint, save energy and meet regulatory requirements without undertaking massive changes to their systems,” said Sanjeev Rastogi, vice president, Honeywell Fluorine Products.

Based on hydrofluoroolefin (HFO) technology, Solstice N40 offers GWP that is approximately 60 per cent lower than legacy HFC refrigerants like R-404A. In addition, Honeywell reports that Solstice N40 also consumes less energy. In the U.S. and European supermarket trials, in comparison to R-404A, Solstice N40 demonstrated an average of five per cent lower energy consumption in low-temperature applications and between five to 15 per cent lower energy consumption in medium-temperature applications.