Evaluation of the Impacts of Refrigerant Charge of HC-290 to Replace HCFC-22 in a Freezer Performance

摘要

Propane (HC-290) is one of hydrocarbons often called as a green refrigerant. As a result, in the long term, this refrigerant is able to be used as a substitute refrigerant to HCFC-22. Generally, the amount of charging HC-290 to replace HCFC-22 based on the density ratio of the refrigerants, for instance, the ratio of liquid density at -10°C between HCFC-22 and HC-290 is 40.59%. Also, most investigations reported that the refrigeration system performances of HC-290 were better compared to HCFC-22 without varying the refrigerant charging of HC-290. By varying the refrigerant charging of HC-290 in a freezer, the performances can be optimized. This study presents an experimental investigation of the impacts on the performances of a freezer when the refrigerant charging of HC-290 is varied replacing HCFC-22. Three performances are reported in the present study, namely: cooling capacity, input power and COP. The first experiment was performed on a freezer using HCFC-22 as working fluid and the amount of refrigerant charging was 450 gram. Furthermore, the tests were carried out using HC-290 with six charging conditions: viz.: 30, 35, 40, 45, 50 and 55% of the mass of HCFC-22. The results showed that when refrigerant of HC-290 was charged 45% (mass) of HCFC-22, the freezer yielded the biggest increase in the cooling capacity and COP.