Natural and synthetic refrigerants, global warming: A review

Halogenated hydrocarbons with high ozone depletion potential (ODP) were banned under Montreal Protocol (1987) due to their detrimental effects on ozone layer that shields the planet against ultraviolet radiations. The greenhouse gases (GHG) used in modern refrigeration, air conditioning, and heat pumping systems, are under Kyoto Protocol (1997)’s time-barred permission period. In order to reduce the depletion of ozone and reverse the climate change effects, the European Union legislation (2014) and Paris Accord (2016) are strongly emphasizing the phasing out of the use of harmful synthetic refrigerants. Choice of natural refrigerants makes no net addition of the greenhouse gases (GHG) in the environment. To retrofit and modify existing cooling and heating systems using natural refrigerants, extensive investigations are in progress worldwide. This work reviews timeworn, current and the next-generation refrigerants using Refrigerant Qualitative Parametric (RQP) quantification model to assist the refrigerant choice decision process. It is based on the ratio of arithmetic sums of actual parametric values of refrigerants normalized to equivalent ideal values. This model can help in choosing alternative refrigerants to replace CFCs by HCFCs or HFCs provisionally and finally replacing HCFCs or HFC to low GWP and ODP synthetic and natural refrigerants. A set of 16 refrigerants, both natural and synthetic, as an example, is computed for the standard Vapour Compression Cycle (VCC) based on the proposed model using REFPROP (NIST- 23 standard). The techno-economic parametric values of chosen refrigerants are taken from cited literature, ASHREA safety standards and international environmental legislations, laws and protocols. This paper reports the environment benign natural (CO2, NH3, HCs) and a few synthetic (R-152a, R-1234yf) refrigerants to be the optimal options.