Compliance & Enforcement: Climate Change Publications

Information for importers of equipment containing fluorinated greenhouse gases on their obligations under the EU F-gas Regulation, European Commission, V2.2, 2

Summary: This guidance focuses, in particular, on obligations under the HFC quota system related to imports of RAC equipment (refrigeration, air conditioning and heat pump equipment) pre-charged with HFCs (F-gas Regulation Article 14).

This guidance covers the requirements under the Regulation (EU) No 517/2014 on fluorinated greenhouse gases (‘the F-gas Regulation’) for companies importing equipment (including products) containing the gases listed in Annexes I and II to the F-gas Regulation (sometimes referred to as pre-charged equipment). Keep in mind that the term ‘equipment’ in this document refers to both stationary and mobile (such as air-conditioning in vehicles) equipment, unless noted otherwise.

Ask yourself these questions to see if this document concerns your company:

1) Is your company the importer? (see section 2.1 Who is the importer?)

2) Is the equipment imported for free circulation in the EU?

3) Does the imported equipment contain gases listed in Annex I and/or Annex II of the F-gas Regulation? The equipment is considered to contain F-gases even if those gases are only found in specific parts of the equipment (e.g. in insulation foams of appliances). However, for F-gas Regulation Article 14 compliance (see sections 3 and 5), only the HFCs charged into the refrigeration circuits are relevant.  

If you answer ‘yes’ to all three questions, your company will have certain obligations under the F-gas Regulation. The aim of this document is to help you understand and comply with those obligations.

The main obligations for importers of equipment containing fluorinated greenhouse gases:

• Importers of stationary and mobile refrigeration, air conditioning and heat pumps (RAC) must make sure that all hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) pre-charged into equipment is accounted for under the HFC quota system (see section 3). Importers will also need to register in the HFC Registry (see section 4) and draw up one or more declaration(s) of conformity (see section 5) at the time of import (F-gas Regulation Articles 14 and 17) and ensure that compliance is fully documented and verified (see section 6).
• Importers of any products or equipment containing gases listed in Annex I (see section 8.1) and/or Annex II (see section 8.2) of the F-gas Regulation must report yearly (see section 7.1) on imports by 31 March of the year following the import (F-gas Regulation Article 19).7
• Restrictions on placing on the market (see section 7.2) apply to certain types of equipment containing Annex I gases. The specific conditions are listed in Annex III of the F-gas Regulation (Article 11).
• Equipment containing Annex I gases needs to be labelled (see section 7.3).

If you are a manufacturer of equipment produced outside the EU (and do not import the equipment to the EU yourself), this document should also be useful to you, as it gives you a better understanding of the rules for importing equipment into the EU and enables you to raise your equipment importers’ awareness related to these rules. You should in particular be aware of the ‘pooling option’, as explained in sections 3 and 4.3, which allows companies such as manufacturers to play a role in complying with the HFC phase-down by centrally procuring authorisations from quota holders and delegating them to those companies which act as the importers of equipment into the EU. Section 7.1 explains how equipment manufacturers may help equipment importers fulfilling importers’ annual reporting obligation.

Furthermore, obligations for EU manufacturers of equipment are summarised in section 7.4.

This guidance contains templates for the Declaration of Conformity and the Auditors verification statement on level of accuracy of the documentation.