The 2025 World Refrigeration Day (WRD) will take place on June 26 with a “Cool Skills” theme designed to “celebrate the incredible range of skills that make modern life possible through refrigeration, air-conditioning, heat pumps and sustainable heating technologies,” according to the event organizers.
Now in its seventh year, WRD 2025 coincides with the 200th anniversary of the birth of Lord Kelvin, a pioneering figure in thermodynamics. Each year, WRD celebrates the people and tech that keep and maintain temperature-controlled environments. The campaign also promotes career opportunities in the sector. In 2024, WRD broadened its focus to include heat pumps to support an increasingly warmer climate under a “Temperature Matters” theme.
Birmingham bound: The InstallerSHOW, a heat, water, air and energy trade event held in Birmingham, England, is partnering with WRD for the second consecutive year. The event will be held June 24‒26 and will host panels, talks and activities designed to promote the technical skills needed for a career in HVAC&R.
- The U.K.-based Institute for Refrigeration will offer technician masterclasses while World Skills International will hold its refrigeration finals. The competition, held every two years, showcases the skills and expertise of young refrigeration and air-conditioning professionals.
- “InstallerSHOW provides a perfect platform for World Refrigeration Day to showcase the vital role of cooling and the people behind it,” said Steve Gill, Founder of WRD, in a comment to KBBFocus.
Aussie events: Supermarket operator Woolworths Group has announced it will hold free events to commemorate WRD on June 26 in six Australian cities: Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, New Castle, Perth and Sydney. Participants will be given a one-hour in-person tour of a store that includes “the opportunity to visit an operating state-of-the-art natural refrigerants plant room,” Woolworths said in a press release.
- The tour will focus on the “vital role” refrigeration technicians play in the transition to natural refrigerants, the company added.
- The retailer is using natural refrigerants CO2 (R744) and propane (R290) in new and refurbished stores, Samantha Bothma, Senior Refrigeration Engineer, said at ATMO Australia 2025. The event was organized by ATMOsphere, publisher of NaturalRefrigerants.com, and held May 12–13 in Sydney.
- Of Woolworths’ 1,150 stores, 125 use transcritical CO2 refrigeration systems, according to ATMOsphere’s “Natural Refrigerants: State of the Industry 2024” report.
Growing the workforce: This is not the first time WRD has focused on attracting and training new talent. It did so in 2023 with a theme of “Next Generation Cooling.”
Quotable: “World Refrigeration Day gives us a great opportunity to draw attention to the cooling industry’s achievements, along with its challenges and opportunities,” said Andrew Gaved, Editor-at-Large for the publications elemental and Installer. “It also allows us to highlight how important it is to have cooling alongside heating in the heart of net zero conversations.”
