Trump eases refrigerant rule in a bid to address surging grocery costs
[May 22, 2026]
By MATTHEW DALY
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration on Thursday loosened federal
rules requiring grocery stores and air-conditioning companies to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions from cooling equipment, a step that President
Donald Trump said would help lower grocery costs.
Trump said at a White House ceremony that the action by the
Environmental Protection Agency would “substantially lower costs for
consumers” by delaying costly restrictions that limit the type of
refrigerants U.S. businesses and families can use.
The move to relax the Biden-era rules on harmful pollutants known as
hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, emitted by refrigerators and other
appliances was the latest attempt by the Republican administration
before pivotal elections in November to try to address rising voter
concerns over the cost of living.
It is not clear how much or how quickly grocery prices could be
impacted. Industry groups said it could even raise prices because
manufacturers have already redesigned products, retooled factories and
trained workers to build and service next-generation refrigerant
equipment.
Inflation in the United States increased to 3.8% annually in April, amid
price spikes caused by the Iran war and Trump’s sweeping tariffs.
Inflation is now outpacing wage gains as the war has kept oil and
gasoline prices high.
The regulation from the Democratic Biden administration was “unnecessary
and costly and actually makes the machinery worse,” Trump said at a
ceremony joined by top executives from Kroger, Piggly Wiggly and other
grocery chains. He said the EPA action would protect hundreds of
thousands of jobs and save Americans more than $2 billion a year.
The Air-Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute, which
represents more than 330 HVAC manufacturers and commercial refrigeration
companies, said the change in approach would “inject uncertainty across
the market” and could even raise prices.
“This rule works against basic supply and demand,” said Stephen Yurek,
the group’s president and CEO. “By extending the compliance deadline”
for phasing out HFCs, the administration “is maintaining and even
increasing demand in the market for existing refrigerants while supply
continues to fall."
The net result will be “higher service costs and higher costs for
consumers,” he said.
Trump once supported limits on refrigerant pollutants
Trump's action marks a reversal after he signed a law in his first term
aimed at reducing harmful, planet-warming pollutants emitted by
refrigerators and air conditioners. That bipartisan measure brought
environmentalists and major business groups into rare alignment on the
contentious issue of climate change and won praise across the political
spectrum.
The 2020 law reflected a broad bipartisan consensus on the need to
quickly phase out domestic use of HFCs, which are thousands of times
more potent than carbon dioxide and are considered a major driver of
global warming.
The EPA action highlights the second Trump administration’s drive to
roll back regulations perceived as climate-friendly. The plan is among a
series of sweeping environmental changes that the agency's
administrator, Lee Zeldin, has said will put a “dagger through the heart
of climate change religion.”
Environmentalists criticized the administration’s actions, saying the
new rule would exacerbate climate pollution while disrupting a yearslong
industry transition to new coolants as an alternative to HFCs.
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President Donald Trump, left, shakes the hand of Kevin McDaniel,
Piggly Wiggly franchise owner, during an event about loosening a
federal refrigerant rule, in the Oval Office at the White House,
Thursday, May 21, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
The law pushed industry toward less harmful alternatives
The 2020 law signed by Trump, known as the American Innovation and
Manufacturing Act, phased out HFCs as part of an international
agreement on ozone pollution. The law accelerated an industry shift
to alternative refrigerants that use less harmful chemicals and are
widely available.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Chemistry Council, the
top lobbying group for the chemical industry, were among numerous
business groups that supported the law and an international deal on
pollutants, known as the Kigali Amendment, as victories for jobs and
the environment. U.S. companies such as Chemours and Honeywell
developed and produce the alternative refrigerants sold in the
United States and around the world.
The 2023 rule, now being relaxed, imposed steep restrictions on HFCs
starting in 2026. Zeldin said the rule from the Democratic Biden
administration did not give companies enough time to comply and that
the rapid switch to other refrigerants caused shortages and price
increases last year. Some in the industry dispute this.
The Food Industry Association, which represents grocery stores and
suppliers, applauded the EPA action.
The earlier rule “imposed significant costs and unrealistic
compliance requirements and timelines that threatened to drive up
grocery prices and create substantial implementation challenges for
food retailers,'' said Leslie Sarasin, the group's president and
CEO.
New rule ensures an ‘orderly transition,’ grocer says
Kroger CEO Greg Foran, whose company operates 2,700 U.S. stores,
told Trump the EPA action ensures “an orderly transition” that
allows the company to update its equipment “in a way which keeps the
price of groceries down. And that’s something that we’re desperately
focusing on, Mr. President.”
Kevin McDaniel, whose company operates 14 Piggly Wiggly stores in
Florida, Alabama and Georgia, said the Biden-era rule would have
forced many independent grocers out of business.
“It was thrown together too fast,'' he said. “The technology is not
there yet. It’s just way too fast. That’s the problem. Good idea,
but it’s terrible."
David Doniger, a senior strategist at the Natural Resources Defense
Council, called Trump's action “a lose-lose for the environment and
the economy. It will harm consumers and the climate and reduce
American competitiveness in the global markets emerging for
environmentally safer refrigerants.”
Rather than address affordability, Trump is imposing “thinly veiled
environmental rollbacks that leave the United States stuck with
outdated technologies of the past,” Doniger said.
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