Experimental investigations on the performance of environmentally friendly refrigerant mixtures in a vapour compression refrigeration system as alternative to CFC12 and HFC134a

Abstract

Today s refrigeration and air conditioning industries are moving towards chlorine and fluorine free working fluids as chlorine is one of the important causative agents for ozone layer depletion and fluorine is responsible for global warming CFC12 the generally accepted and more suitable refrigerant for vapour compression refrigeration system was phased out by 1996 in developed countries and has to be phased out by 2010 in developing countries because of its high ozone depletion potential and global warming potential HFC134a has been suggested to replace CFC12 in vapour compression refrigeration systems HFCs are used with polyolester oil only as it is immiscible with the conventional mineral oil The POE oil is highly hygroscopic and makes the system vulnerable to problems due to moisture entry Hydrofluorocarbons are safer to ozone layer but it has high global warming potential Kyoto Protocol aimed at reducing the overall emissions of green house gases by at least 5 below 1990 level in the commitment period 2008 to 2012 For this reason, the production and use of HFC134a will be terminated in the near future Millions of refrigeration systems heat pumps and air conditioners all over the world operating with CFC12 and HFC134a have to be retrofitted suitably in the event of the above phase out However very few studies exist on the replacement of HFC134a refrigerant This has motivated to study the newlineperformance of vapour compression refrigeration system with some of the available environment friendly fluids as replacements for CFC12 and HFC134a newline