I-Corps: Reclaiming, separating, recycling, and repurposing fluorocarbon-based refrigerants

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of a technology for reclaiming, separating, recycling, and repurposing hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants. Today, only a small fraction of refrigerants are reclaimed for re-use. Most fluorinated refrigerants have high global warming potential; By weight, they are orders of magnitude more potent than carbon dioxide in increasing global warming.

The refrigerant industry tries to recover as much HFC as economically practical for re-use but they are challenged by the an array of mixtures of refrigerants that are not possible to separate. The result is that less than 10% of refrigerant is reclaimed and millions of kilograms of HFCs must be replaced in the U.S. annually. The proposed technology is designed to separate hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerant mixtures so components may be recycled.

The market potential is valued at over $1 billion while preventing the release of HFCs would be equivalent to removing over 175 million metric tons of carbon dioxde (or emissions from 50 million cars) in one year.

This I-Corps project is based on the development of energy-efficient processes to separate hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) mixtures so that the components may be recycled and repurposed into environmentally safe products. The proposed technology is based on ionic liquids, porous media, and membranes for the separation of HFC refrigerant mixtures. The integrated strategy of materials discovery and experimental measurements are tightly coupled with process modeling.

Ionic liquids are being developed to separate HFC mixtures based on differences in gas solubility. Process simulations have been used to design an extractive distillation process that is under construction using an ionic liquids. The pilot-scale extractive distillation will provide proof-of-concept demonstration of the pressure/temperature swing adsorption system and a hollow-fiber membrane separation module.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.