A review of refrigerant R1234ze(E) recent investigations

Abstract

Climate change is demonstrated through global surface temperatures increase in the last century. To stop this phenomenon, new regulations that ban or taxes greenhouse gas fluids (HFC among them) have being approved. In the medium term, only low-GWP refrigerants will be permitted in developed countries. HFO are synthetic fluids that show similar properties to used HFC. Among them, one of the most promising is R1234ze(E). This refrigerant presents good environmental properties and can be used in most of HVACR applications, pure or mixed with HFC or natural refrigerants (mainly CO2). This paper collects the most relevant research about R1234ze(E) thermophysical and compatibility properties, heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics, and vapour compression system performance; separating those works that considers R1234ze(E) pure or blended. Once analyzed literature available, it can be concluded that pure R1234ze(E) is a good option only in new HVACR systems. Nevertheless, if it is combined with other refrigerants also reduces considerably the final GWP value, maintaining efficiency parameters at levels that allow them to replace R134a, R404A or R410A in existing systems with minor modifications.

Reduction of the Greenhouse Gasses Emissions in Refrigeration

“…These refrigerants have zero ODP and very small GWP which guarantee a very short lifetime once released in the atmosphere [7,8]. The current state of the art reveals that the HFOs have been tested as drop-in replacement of domestic refrigerators previously operating with HFC134a [9][10][11][12][13].…”

An experimental investigation on the substitution of HFC134a with HFO1234YF in a domestic refrigerator

“…According to [10,40], it is evident the limited presence of experimental investigation ended to validate the possibility of replacing HFC134a with HFOs in domestic refrigerators, and at the same time, it highlights the need to investigate in that direction. In this regard, this article presents the experimental analysis of HFO1234yf (Table 1) as a drop-in replacement for HFC134a in a frost-free domestic refrigerator.…”

Performance improvement potentials of low global warming potential refrigerants for intercity bus air conditioning system

“…3, pp. -1524 Another candidate refrigerant R1234ze(E) has been proposed in new systems of medium temperature applications [8] because the vapor pressure of R1234ze(E) is between -28% and -24% compared with R134a. Yataganbaba et al [9] presented exergy analysis of R1234yf and R1234ze(E) in a two-evaporator refrigeration system.…”