31.05.2023.
Last year the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund financed retrofitting of HVAC devices that were using ozone-depleting substances and fluorinated greenhouse gases in 28 public institutions, and will continue with this scheme of co-financing in this year.Ozone-depleting substances and fluorinated greenhouse gases are used in the cooling and air-conditioning systems, but their uncontrolled release into the atmosphere depletes the ozone layer that protects the Earth from harmful UV radiation. Once released into the atmosphere, they have several thousand times greater global warming potential than CO2.
To facilitate the transition and promote further use of climate-friendly technologies, the Fund launched a public call worth in total EUR 5 million. Grants will be approved for the replacement of chlorofluorocarbons (CFC), chlorofluorohydrocarbons (HCHC), and fluorinated hydrocarbons (HFC) in refrigeration and AC systems that are more than 14 years old, and in heat pumps filled with refrigerants exceeding 10 tonnes of CO2 eq. In addition, the co-financing scheme covers the replacement of stationary cooling systems in cold storage that use fluorinated greenhouse gases. The new public call is aimed at local and regional self-government units, their public institutions, state administration bodies, public and private companies, and trades.
To the budgetary users, the Fund will finance in full the retrofit of refrigerants in cooling and AC devices and heat pumps, with the maximum amount per project up to 110,000 euros. Regarding the public and private companies and trades, they will be eligible for up to 40% of co-financing, or up to 15,00 euros for the purchase of devices from 2.5 up to 10 kW of cooling capacity. For the devices with higher cooling capacity, the Fund will approve up to 40,000 euros of eligible costs of the total value of investment per individual cooling system.
As a party to the Montreal Protocol, Croatia pledged to phase out, in compliance with the set deadlines, the production and consumption of the ozone-depleting substances and fluorinated greenhouse gases. Co-financing of such projects is part of activities promoting the transition to technologies dependent on approved active substances with low global warming potential and low impact on climate change, which are at the same time energy efficient.
28 projects were approved under the last year’s call resulting in the overall reduction of impact on global warming of 5665 t of CO2 equivalent, which can be compared to the removal of the annual emissions generated by the use of fossil fuels in around 2300 households.
