The International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR) has published guidelines for evaluating the life cycle climate performance of refrigeration systems. While climate change is an ingreasingly important global concern, discussions about the climate impact is often limited to the global warming potential (GWP) of the cluids used. This is far too restrictive, says the IIR, as it does not take into account the real emissions of fluids, and ignores indirect emissions, especially those related to energy use over the life time of the equipment. The IIR’s life cycle climate performance (LCCP) working group has developed this guideline and an abbreviated guideline for performing LCCP calculations for air conditioning, heat pumps and refriveration systems with recommended assumptions and data sources for different types of units. The guide aims to provide designers, facility operators, manufacturers, and policy makers a way to effectively evaluate and compare the environmental impact of different systems over the course of their lifetimes.