Performance enhancement of a vapor compression cycle with R32/R1234yf by using internal heat exchanger

Kang Wang, Ye Liu and Jianlin Yu

Energy, 2025, vol. 336, issue C

Abstract: The internal heat exchanger (IHX) has been widely employed in vapor compression cycle to improve performances, which is also called the subcooling vapor compression cycle (SVCC). In this paper, the influence of IHX on cycle performance using zeotropic blend R32/R1234yf is evaluated theoretically. The potential benefits of IHX due to the use of zeotropic mixture with temperature glide feature are analyzed for air conditioner applications. The performance of the SVCC using R32/R1234yf with a mass fraction of 0.2/0.8, which has a maximum temperature glide of 7.9 °C, is compared in detail with that of the basic vapor compression cycle (BVCC) using R32. The refrigerant temperature at the condenser outlet is set from 35 °C to 55 °C in cooling mode and from 25 °C to 35 °C in heating mode. The subcooling at the outlet of the condenser and the superheating at the inlet of the compressor are both 5 °C. The results confirm that the SVCC using R32/R1234yf is prior to the BVCC using R32. The cooling COP (COPc) of the mixture is 1.0 %–4.7 % and the heating COP (COPh) is 4.1 %–8.4 %, which are all higher than R32. The compressor pressure ratio, compressor power consumption and discharge temperature of the R32/R1234yf are lower compared to pure refrigerant R32. It is evident that the cooling and heating performance of SVCC are enhanced by using zeotropic blend R32/R1234yf.

Keywords: Internal heat exchanger (IHX); Zeotropic mixture; Temperature glide; Performance improvement (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544225040733
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:336:y:2025:i:c:s0360544225040733

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2025.138431

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().