A carbon dioxide-focused curriculum for community college and trade school HVAC and refrigeration programs is under development to address a shortage of technicians trained to install and service natural refrigerant technologies.

CO₂ is considered a climate-friendly alternative to traditional hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants but its deployment Source: NASRCin supermarkets and other facilities has been hindered by high initial costs, lack of performance data and a shortage of technicians trained in natural refrigerants. Limited training opportunities and resources pertinent to this emerging technology prompted the North American Sustainable Refrigeration Council (NASRC), a nonprofit group advocating adoption of natural refrigerants, and ESCO Group, an educational and training body for the HVAC and refrigeration industry, to collaborate on the creation of a CO₂ curriculum.

A committee composed of CO₂ experts, training specialists, contractors and technicians, equipment manufacturers and school representatives are now devising the course content, which is scheduled to be completed and made available to educational facilities in 2021.