In response to over 100,000 consumers demanding progress from Walmart on refrigerants, Walmart announced that it will be transitioning to low-impact refrigerants for cooling and electrified equipment for heating in its stores, clubs, and data and distribution centers by 2040.

This is an important first step and acknowledgement from Walmart that it needs to address refrigerants, but the timeline is too slow given the enormous impact refrigerants have on climate change, and Walmart is not addressing refrigerant leaks occurring in their thousands of store world wide.

Walmart currently uses hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), a refrigerant that is a major contributor to climate change. This harmful, synthetic gas is the fastest increasing greenhouse gas entering our atmosphere and thousands of times more potent than CO2.  Refrigerants are the largest source of direct climate emissions from Walmart, and are equivalent to the emissions from powering all the households in San Francisco.

Green America will continue to put pressure on Walmart through our Cool It campaign until the company adopts an accelerated timeline for addressing emissions and addresses current HFC leaks from its stores.