Rick Downie, the manager of technical education for Bard Mfg. Co. Inc., has won the runner-up honors in the 2017 edition of The NEWS’ Best Trainer competition.

The Food Marketing Institute’s (FMI’s) 2017 Energy & Store Development Conference will be held September 24-27 at the Hilton Bonnet Creek in Orlando, Florida. The conference offers an opportunity for leaders of the food retail industry and their business partners to discuss new refrigeration technology, energy-efficiency and conservation, as well as refrigeration system and store design.

Hudson Technologies Inc. has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Airgas Refrigerants Inc. (ARI). The transaction is expected to close before the end of the year. 

According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 10,804,918 lbs. of ozone-depleting refrigerant was reported as reclaimed by EPA-certified reclaimers in 2016. The total includes 9,409,494 lbs. of R-22.

It is said that every story has two sides, and two recent conversations I had with estimable members of the refrigeration industry vividly illustrated that. Both of these gentlemen have been involved in the industry for a long time -- one on the supplier side and one on the contracting side. The topic of both conversations was the ruling by a United States court of appeals that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) cannot ban the use of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) under Section 612 of the Clean Air Act. The topic was the same, but the conversations were very different.