Soft drinks giant PepsiCo announced plans to phase out equipment in the US which contains greenhouse gases harmful to the atmosphere by 2020.

Yesterday it revealed the aim to eliminate hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) from “point-of-sale” equipment such as coolers, vending machines and fountain dispensers purchased in the United States.

Starting from 2015 the firm won’t buy any such items which have HFCs.

The Obama Administration has just set up a scheme with US firms, aiming to slash global use of HFCs by the equivalent of 700 million metric tons of carbon dioxide by 2025.

PepsiCo also signed up to two documents calling for action on climate change: the Climate Declaration and the Trillion Tonne Communique.

The move comes ahead of the UN’s Climate Summit next week when world leaders meet in New York.

Indra Nooyi, Chairman & CEO of PepsiCo said: “Combating climate change is absolutely critical to the future of our company, customers, consumers—and our world. I believe all of us need to take action now.”

She added: “PepsiCo has already taken actions in our operations and throughout our supply chain to ‘future-proof’ our company—all of which deliver real cost savings, mitigate risk, protect our license to operate and create resilience in our supply chain.”

PepsiCo recently reported a 14% improvement in energy efficiency across its “legacy footprint” compared to a 2006 baseline.