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Hello,
I'm plaining on making grow boxes out of fridges for re-sale. Do i need a licence to dismantle (release fridge gas) from my home? I live in the UK
I have searched the internet but could not find a direct answer, any help in this matter would be most appreciated.
you can not just release the gas it needs to be recovered as well as the oil
Ok, how do i safely (with in the law) do that?
2079-13 or cskills j13
I unfortunately do not have these qualification.Quote:
Originally Posted by Quality
Ok, can i get someone to remove the gas for me?
maybe contact your local council, they degas and send the fridges for destruction, they could point you in the direction of picking a few up? Nice idea btw!
alec
Cheers for that, i will look into it.Quote:
Originally Posted by al
Kirk
What kind of fridges are you talking about?Quote:
Originally Posted by Metal Head
How many do you have to do?
The council would not realy be able to just remove the refrigerant,
theyn are only going to recover the whole fridge with all the components.
The removal of the old compressor and refrigerant would be simple to
somone with the right equipment and training.
One domestic size fridge could be decomissioned in 10 to 15 mins and
more than one could be done at once so 10 or more could be done in
a morning.
You need to look in your local press and find a small fridge company and
they will do it for you at an hourly rate.
All the best
taz
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I've been messing about with fridges for a couple of months now, just as a side project. I've got the lights, fans, carbon filter and electric sorted. Need to do a few more test on heating and cooling temps. One more test fridge and i should have it looking professonal.
At the minute i've just been getting old tatey fridges cost me almost nothing but when/if i get round to selling em i may have to splash out a pound or 2 to get a nice one.
All was going well until a friend of mine mentioned about the gas and what i was going to do about it... 1 or 2 you may get a way with it he reckoned but not 2, 3 + a week. That's what lead me here...
Thanks for all the advise has been most helpful
Quote:
Originally Posted by Metal Head
The refrigerants and oils are the problem.
If it becomes known that you are getting in old fridges and then selling them on,
that is a for profit commercial venture and you will be noticed in the area.
Legaly, you can't just open the systems up as you now know but the problems
arise when you remove the waste from the fridge. Once removed it becomes a
controled substance and there is a raft of legal requirements associated with that.
You would be ok if you got 10 or 20 at a time and then paid someone to remove
the refrigerant and compressors (with the oil), say once a month and then you would
just pay once for each batch.
The real cost would be in transporting the waste and its correct disposal. The actual
doing of the removal is the cheapest easy bit.
But if this is going to be a busness then it does need doing correctly and you must keep
the paperwork to prove you do it correctly.
As you say one or two accidental releases although not desirable, would go un noticed.
If you were trading in a few a month then you will come up on sombodies radar and if they
ask you to provide proof of correct disposal you need the correct documentation.
All the best
taz
.
Quote:
Originally Posted by taz24
After a lot of phone calls and dissapointment i finaly got a quote for £79 just to remove the gas.
Then after reading your post i realized i needed the compressor and oil to be removed aswel so i phoned them back for them to tell me they couldn't even remove the gas only refill.
They told me i would only be able to get it done at specialist recyling statioin X amount of miles away and would cost me to much, ok if i was doing 10 or 20 or so.
Then i get a phone call from another enquirey telling me they would remove the compressor, gas and oil for £30 and even come to my home plus they would give me a little bit of paper with all the work done on it... A bit more optimistic!
Cheers again
kirk
Hi,
you could ask someone to recover the gas, but the fridges would still be contaminated with the oil, and removing oil from a domestic fridge is a hard task, and even recycling centers do not remove it properly, because it'snot very cost effective for them to handle too much every fridge.
Good luck!
Nando
I have another questions... If i have the compressor and refrigerant (oil n gas) removed from the fridge by an engineer is the fridge legally safe for me to re-package and sale?
I'd imagine it would depend on what you're reselling them as, in essence it's just an insulated box at that stage but there may be issues with the insulation in the fridge if the box is punctured, i'd be advertising as recycling discarded fridges and see how you go!
Good luck with the enterprise, keep us updated eh?
alec
That's the thing i'm going to be selling em as grow boxes not fridges also i will be cutting holes in the fridge for the fans and lights.Quote:
Originally Posted by al
Just need to know if i'm on the right side of the law or not before i invest anymore.
Yeah, i will keep you all updated!
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There’s been a lengthy discussion on the regulations regarding removing the materials from the fridges – Oils, refrigerants etc.
It’s true that the current law prohibits the deliberate venting of refrigerant and states that it must be processed by qualified individuals. Over the past 10 years this has all be done to death in all its aspects on this forum.
In my view, the real point of the original post concerned the materials in the fridges, not who does what to it.
Because it is no longer put to its intended use - a fridge – the law in the UK regards it as WASTE.
This means all of it, not just some of it, and the waste materials are in fact covered under the Hazardous Waste Regulations.
There are three forms of Hazardous Waste in a domestic fridge:
The refrigerant gas ( we don’t know what it is in this case)
The oil in the compressor.
And finally, what has been overlooked so far, the foam insulation.
Again, we don’t know what the insulation is blown with, but it is classed also as hazardous waste and licenses are required by law to dispose of it along with the rest, alonng with the requirements to handle it.
Sorry to rain on your parade – but if I were you, I’d forget it and dispose of the fridges responsibly.
If they were any use as grow-boxes, I expect that people would be making loads of money out of them already.
PS - I should also mention that many old fridges, prior to the 80s / 90s were finished with paints that are no longer permitted from a toxicity point of view. Not recommended for growing vegetables or in contact with ground water.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Argus
This was my main concern, i did always wounder why there weren't any grow fridges on the market. The fridges i was using were no older than 10 years old.
Oh well, back to the drawing board i guess...
Thanks for all the help!
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One of the TV / Radio gardening ‘gurus’ in the UK (one with a particularly strong ‘green’ or ‘organic’ pedigree) advocated the use of old chest freezers as sunken containers for growing things in. some years ago. I fell off the chair laughing at the time……
He’s unusually silent on the subject nowadays.
If your fridges are less than 10 years old, there is a stronger than 50/50 chance that they contain one of the various types of Hydrocarbons as a refrigerant. This is basically purified propane and flammable. The type will be identified by a number on the name plate.
The insulation is also likely to be a Hydrocarbon base.
The law now requires fridge manufacturers to identify the foam blowing agent, so you may see the words ‘Pentane’ in large type on the back by the condenser coil. This is a HC. older fridges were not identified.
Scrap yard personnel are unable or unwilling to tell the difference between the various components and chemicals in fridges and always treat the stuff as the worst case – CFCs -and destroy the fridges in an enclosed atmosphere. The gases and residue is then reclaimed and incinerated at high temperature.
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