What does the Air Conditioner Refrigerant “R22” Mean?

R22 refrigerant is a member of the Freon family and belongs to hydrochlorofluorocarbons.

Freon is a general term for halogen derivatives of saturated hydrocarbons (hydrocarbons), and is a type of refrigerant that emerged with the development of the chemical industry in the 1930s. Its appearance solves the pursuit of refrigerants in the refrigeration and air-conditioning industry. From the definition of Freon, it can be seen that the non-freon R134a, R410A and R407C are actually all Freon.

R22 refrigerant can destroy the ozone layer because of the presence of CL elements in the refrigerant. Moreover, as the number of CL atoms increases, the ability to destroy the ozone layer increases, and as the content of H element increases, the ability to destroy the ozone layer decreases. The main cause of the greenhouse effect is that the refrigerant generates a large amount of greenhouse gases, such as CO2, during the slow oxidation and decomposition process. According to the molecular structure of Freon refrigerants, they can be roughly divided into the following three categories.

1. Chlorofluorocarbons, referred to as CFC, mainly include R11, R12, R113, R114, R115, R500, R502, etc. Due to its damaging effect on the ozone layer and its large size, it is listed as a class of controlled substances by the Montreal Protocol. Such substances are currently banned. In the process of manufacturing polyurethane sponge, R11 has been replaced by R141b as a transitional substitute.

2. Hydrochlorofluorocarbons, referred to as HCFCs, mainly include r22 refrigerants, R123, R141b, R142b, etc. The ozone depletion coefficient is only a few percent of that of R11. Therefore, HCFCs are currently regarded as important transitional substitutes for CFCs. In the “Montreal Protocol”, R22 is limited to 2020, R123 is limited to 2030, and developing countries can postpone it for 10 years.

3. Hydrofluorocarbons, referred to as HFC, mainly include R134a, R125, R32, R407C, R410A, R152, etc. The ozone depletion factor is 0, but the climate warming potential is high. In the “Montreal Protocol” does not stipulate its use period, in the “United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change” Kyoto Protocol qualitative as a greenhouse gas.

All the refrigerants we currently use are Freon products, and non-Freon refrigerants have not been developed so far. Before new refrigerants are developed, what we have to solve is which refrigerant to choose will cause relatively less damage to the environment we live in. What we should explicitly ban should be Class 1 refrigerants, not Class 2 and Class 3 refrigerants.