Natural refrigerant-based refrigeration and heat pump systems are alive and well in New Zealand despite its location about 1,000 miles (1,609km) southeast of Australia – “the bottom of the world.”
That is certainly the view of Jared Bright, Contract Manager for Actíve Refrigeration, a 26-year-old HVAC&R contractor company based in Christchurch, New Zealand.
The government of New Zealand has been proactive about regulating HFCs and paving the way for natural refrigerants. It is one of the few countries in the world to tax imports of products containing HFCs.
But there is still considerable potential for growth in refrigeration and HVAC applications using natural refrigerants in New Zealand, which has an advanced market economy and a population of about 5.4 million.
Active is a major provider of refrigeration systems for industrial applications, serving New Zealand’s substantial meat, poultry and dairy industries as well as food distribution and cold storage operators. Its customers include major New Zealand operators like Alliance Group (meats), Fonterra (dairy), Bidfood (distribution) and Foodstuffs (retail), as well as Coolpak, Lineage and Americold (cold storage).
“We’ve always been very interested in natural refrigerants and have done a lot of work with ammonia [R717], and in recent years, more with CO2 [R744] as well,” said Bright, who spoke to NaturalRefrigerants.com at the 17th IIR-Gustav Lorentzen Conference on Natural Refrigerants, held August 23–26 in Hamilton, New Zealand. “We have a huge focus on energy efficiency and sustainability so natural refrigerants are right at the heart of what we do. Everything we do in the industrial field is based on natural.”
Active has installed hundreds of ammonia refrigeration systems over the years, particularly ammonia glycol chillers, the company’s “bread and butter,” said Bright. In addition, ammonia pump recirculation systems are still popular among industrial clients “that operate their plant hard and can’t afford any downtime.” Next on the agenda is low-charge ammonia systems, such as DX (direct expansion) ammonia. “We have installed DX ammonia before, but we think there’s still more potential there,” he noted.
The growing use of automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS) is making ammonia refrigeration a more acceptable option in cold storage since there is minimal risk of exposure, he pointed out.
Sweet spot for CO2
Over the last six years Active has been installing transcritical CO2 systems for its industrial and cold storage clients “where it’s the right fit,” often as a replacement for synthetic refrigeration, said Bright. “We’ve found a real sweet spot for CO2 at 150 to 250kW [43 to 71TR] of cold storage, normally with some medium temperature loads such as chillers.”
As a replacement for f-gas systems, CO2 enables the use of a natural refrigerant without the need to build new infrastructure for ammonia, Bright said. In addition, the pricing of CO2 systems “seems to have become a little bit better.” He noted that Active is reliant on OEM manufacturers for transcritical CO2 racks, whereas for other projects, “we tend to do a lot of in-house engineering ourselves.”
Active also deploys CO2 in ammonia/CO2 cascade systems for extremely low-temperature applications, such as a -50°C (-58°F), 2.5MW (711TR) freezing tunnel. In addition, ammonia/CO2 systems using CO2 as a pumped secondary brine have been installed in the dairy industry and supermarket distribution centers. “We’ll probably look at more opportunities for CO2 as a brine,” said Bright, adding, “Using the ammonia/CO2 methodology has enabled us to keep the ammonia out of occupied spaces.”
Commercial refrigeration on the horizon
Active plans to move more into the commercial sector with “lower scale” systems for both refrigeration and heat pumps, said Bright. He noted that the biggest challenge in the commercial arena is the availability of equipment. “New Zealand being at the bottom of the world, it can take a long time for equipment to get here. For example, the availability of packaged R290 [propane] chiller is problematic.”
Supply chain challenges also impact parts for industrial systems built in-house, which can be subject to 28 weeks lead time. “We have to factor that in when designing systems,” he said. “The availability of spare parts affects some of our decision making and the architecture of a system that we’re designing. Because first and foremost, the client has got to be able to keep running.”
Another issue holding back natural refrigerants like CO2 in New Zealand is industry knowledge, Bright said. “We like to engineer in-house and design to a client specification, as opposed to putting in a box that can fit a wide range. So we need more training and understanding.” End users, too, need to be educated on the importance of natural refrigerants.
Although New Zealand is a small country, natural refrigerant OEMs and component manufacturers around the world have an opportunity to better serve a vibrant economy. “It’s easy with a smaller base to be able to get a high conversion rate and then be the showcase to the rest of the world,” said Bright. “There’s no reason why we couldn’t be that, particularly for transcritical CO2. We have climates here where transcritical systems will go to transcritical mode for just one hour a year.”
HVAC opportunities
Active has had great success with ammonia heat pumps, installing the first ammonia hot water heat pump in New Zealand in 2012 with some funding from the government’s Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (EECA). Since then, the contractor’s ammonia heat pumps have provided up to 25MW (7,109TR) of hot water generation up to about 85°C (185°F), leveraging waste heat from refrigeration systems and waste water, dam water, river water and other sources. “We’ve had some fantastic COPs out of them that have got rid of a whole lot of coal and dirty energy.”
In August, Active, alongside its meat-producing client Alliance Group, received the Low Carbon Future Award at the 2026 New Zealand Energy Excellence Awards for Alliance’s high-temperature heat pump projects. “We converted three of their sites from coal boilers to ammonia heat pumps and eliminated the use of three train carriages of coal per day, which is 25,000 carbon tons equivalent per year,” said Bright. “We’re proud of that. It’s nice to make a positive difference to the world.”
“We have a huge focus on energy efficiency and sustainability so natural refrigerants are right at the heart of what we do.”
Jared Bright, Contract Manager for Active Refrigeration
In another significant development, the New Zealand government is funding feasibility studies of steam-generation ammonia heat pumps that generate temperatures above 90°C (194°F). These would use equipment from Europe, where research into this application has taken place.
But in other regards, the HVAC market in New Zealand is “probably well behind” with natural refrigerants such as propane for packaged chillers, said Bright. He believes the biggest barrier is ensuring that imported propane equipment meets Australian/New Zealand electrical standards for the use of flammable substances. “It needs to be certified before it gets here.”
Australia and New Zealand use the IECEx (international certification scheme alongside the AS/NZS 60079 series of technical standards. Europe’s ATEX certification alone (with just a CE mark) is generally not accepted without proper IECEx or AS/NZS compliance. However, the much larger country of Australia has begun installing R290 chillers, which are very popular in Europe.
Active is ready for hydrocarbon-based HVAC equipment, having long experience dealing with restrictions around ammonia, Bright noted. The contractor’s HVAC arm is based in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, focusing on government and high-rise buildings. “There is a massive opportunity,” he said.
