In early 2024, we launched Train the Trainer, a pilot program aimed at equipping HVACR school faculty with training on climate-friendly refrigeration technologies. The program concluded in December 2024 and was generously supported by the SoCalGas Climate Champions Grant, which recognizes programs, projects and research submissions that address climate solutions for communities in SoCalGas service areas.
Supermarkets face a growing technician shortage as the industry transitions from refrigerants with high global warming potential. The shrinking workforce is creating a bottleneck, slowing the transition to climate-friendly technologies and threatening to disrupt essential operations and food security. While many strong HVACR programs exist nationwide, most focus on HVAC with little or no focus on supermarket refrigeration or natural refrigerants.
“Our Train the Trainer program was designed to prepare school faculty to integrate both supermarket refrigeration and climate-friendly refrigerants into HVACR coursework, fostering a new generation of refrigeration technicians with the skillset to install and service natural refrigerant technologies,” says Morgan Vanzo, senior director of NASRC.
About Train the Trainer
Launched in January 2024, the program provided Southern California HVACR school faculty and instructors with opportunities for online and field training on market refrigeration and CO2 refrigeration systems. The program concluded in August with a two-day field training and knowledge assessment at the CoolSys training center in Fullerton, California.
Thirteen faculty members from seven local schools participated. All participants reported significant improvement in their knowledge of CO2 refrigerants, and nearly all reported significant improvement in their supermarket refrigeration knowledge. NASRC is working with two participating schools to expand their curriculum to include supermarket refrigeration and climate-friendly refrigerants; other participating schools have expressed interest.
NASRC is committed to supporting the development of faculty education programs beyond the grant’s duration and plans to extend the program to more regions. Subscribe to our newsletter for program updates.