The Challenge of Circular Economy - Recycling Refrigerant 410A
We welcome you to this hybrid event hosted by The Joint Chemical Engineering Committee (JCEC), New South Wales, focusing on "The Challenge of Circular Economy - Recycling Refrigerant 410A.
The Challenge of Circular Economy - Recycling Refrigerant 410A
Recycling valuable material to extend its useful life is key to a Circular Economy and Sustainability, but is this just a lofty ideal? This talk will look at a real-world example of such an aspiration and the chemical engineering challenges to be faced if this is not to be just rhetoric.
The refrigerant R410A is designed to replace certain ozone-depleting chlorinated alternatives but has turned out to have significant greenhouse gas potential. It is an azeotropic 50:50 mixture of 2 hydrofluorocarbons, namely R32 and R125, which represent low and high GHG potentials, respectively. While it makes sense to recycle the good and to destroy the bad, the policy in Australia favors total destruction.
A major Japanese refrigeration company, Daikin, has done the numbers using a new LCA method known as LIME3, which shows destruction is 20 fold more environmentally damaging than recycling (USD 810/tonne versus USD 40/tonne). Worldwide there are more than 100,000 tonnes of R410A on death row. Numerous processes, many at the model stage, have been offered to separate these azeotropic mixtures but none has reached the pilot plant stage.
The talk will examine the best of these and also offer the speaker’s alternative process for review.
Agenda
18:00 - Doors Open
18:10 - Refreshments & networking
18:30 – Introduction
18:35 - Speaker presentation
19:15 - Q&A
20:00 - Doors Close
Register to attend
Tuesday 27 February 2023, 18:00-19:30 AEDT
Venue: Online and
University of New South Wales
Meet your speaker
Dr Wayne Davies
Director SN2 PTY LTD, University of Sydney
Wayne Davies is a chemical engineer with eclectic interests. He took his undergraduate degree and PhD at USYD where he studied a branch of immunology. This led him to post doctoral position at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and at the Kolling Institute at RNSH where he developed a mathematical model for the kinetics of bactericidal activity of macrophages, possibly a world first.
Wayne then returned to USYD where he remained for 16 years as a private consultant. In this capacity he enjoyed engagements from expert witnessing to mineral processing, destruction of scheduled i.e. toxic, wastes, plant design, process design, cryogenics, and supercritical fluid processes. He built his own supercritical continuous plant for making biodiesel attracting European interests. Wayne continues to act in legal cases, designing mineral processes and as it happens, processes for responsible recycling of refrigerants.
Navigating to the Venue
There are 2 Light Rail stops at UNSW and one stops across the road from the building. There are also a number of bus services available to catch from Central station and the CBD.
There should be plenty of parking space in UNSW including the NIDA carpark. Parking is free between 7.30pm – 7.30am on weekdays. Before that time, a motor vehicle must have a valid virtual permit (vPermit), or have a current parking session on the CellOPark app or have paid for parking at one of the pay-by-plate meters.
CellOPark is a native smart phone application, which is downloadable on both iOS and Android, and allows registered users to pay for parking directly from their mobile phone by using a credit card.
Contact Us
If you have any questions please contact ktwan@icheme.org
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