As National Skills Week rolls around for the eleventh year, there’s positive news for the Refrigeration and Air Conditioning (RAC) sector, with numbers of apprentices and trainees enrolled at TAFEs around Australia at a ten-year high.

On June 24, ARC Field Officers were onsite at various Kirby branches across Australia serving up free sausages and drinks for RAC technicians in celebration of World Refrigeration Day (WRD), an annual event aimed at raising the profile of the important contribution that refrigeration and air conditioning makes globally across vital aspects of modern life.

April 17 doesn’t generally ring with recognition for most people, but it should. Particularly for those of us who enjoy a cold beverage on a hot day.

While you won’t find refrigeration and air conditioning (RAC) apprentices studying about repair jobs for oxygen molecules in the stratosphere, the skilled work of licensed technicians to control the use of refrigerants is having a very real impact on the ozone layer and the environment.

The United States and China have announced they will each implement the phase-down of hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) production and consumption reflected in the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol and have “committed to cooperating” with each other and with other countries to tackle the 'climate crisis'.