Navy Investigations of HFC‐134a as a Replacement for CFC‐12 in Shipboard Applications

Abstract

Global concerns about the depletion of the earth's protective stratospheric ozone layer caused in part by the atmospheric release of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), have prompted the United States Congress in the 1990 Amendments to the U.S. Clean Air Act to require a large reduction in the production of CFCs and a total production ban of CFCs by the year 2000. This production ban date was recently accelerated by President Bush to 31 Dec. 1995. The U.S. Navy used approximately 2 million pounds of CFC‐12 (R‐12), 415 thousand pounds of CFC‐114 (R‐114) and 111 thousand pounds of CFC‐11 (R‐11) in calendar year 1990. These CFCs are mostly used as refrigerants in shipboard air conditioning and refrigeration plants in critical applications including cooling of vital shipboard sensors, communications, navigation and weapon systems. Naval Sea Systems Command (NavSea) has an aggressive research and development effort underway to investigate environmentally acceptable substitutes for CFCs for eventual fleet implementation. A potential substitute for CFC‐12 in air conditioning and refrigeration plants is HFC‐134a (1,1,1,2 Tetrafluoroethane). This paper presents Navy HFC‐134a investigation results to date, planned qualification tests, and future shipboard HFC‐134a air conditioning plant designs.