The Cold Chain Innovation Hub (CCI-Hub) in the Philippines has joined the world’s leading natural refrigerant HVAC&R stakeholders as a silver partner of the NaturalRefrigerants.com marketplace.
Based at the government’s Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA)’s Regional Training Center in Manila, the CCI-Hub is committed to advancing low-carbon refrigeration technologies and business practices across the country’s food cold chain. It serves as a central ecosystem for technical resources, training, knowledge sharing and stakeholder collaboration.
Originally launched in 2019 under the Global Partnership for Improving the Food Cold Chain in the Philippines (FCC) project – a United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO)-led initiative that concluded earlier this year – the CCI-Hub was recently handed over to TESDA.
The Philippines’ Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and ATMOphere, publisher of NaturalRefrigerants.com, also supported the FCC project, and the Global Environment Facility (GEF) provided project funding.
Championing NatRefs in the Philippines
In addition to showcasing several CO2 (R744)- and propane (R290)-based technologies, the Hub has focused on awareness raising, capacity building, education and training to enhance the knowledge, skills and best practices within the country’s HVAC&R sector. Over the past few years, it has hosted numerous training workshops, surpassing its targets in educating industry practitioners both online and face-to-face.
Another major component of the CCI-Hub has been its 10 sustainable refrigeration pilots, designed to demonstrate how improved cold chains can help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, operational costs and food loss in the Philippines.
Supported projects have included propane- and CO2-based refrigerated transport, plug-in propane refrigeration units at a nonprofit farming project and the Philippines’ first transcritical CO2-based cold chain facility and blast freezer. Isobutane (R600a)-based solar powered freezers were also distributed to various end users across the municipalities of Carles, Palawan, Abra, Cebu and Sorsogon under the initiative.
Each demonstration received funding from the FCC and CCI-Hub for up to 80% of project costs.
