in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com).Novel processes involving ionic liquids with refrigerant gases have recently been developed. Here, the complete global phase behavior has been measured for the refrigerant gas, 1,1,1,2-tetrafluoroethane (R-134a) and 1-n-alkyl-3-methyl-imidazolium ionic liquids with the anions hexafluorophosphate [PF 6 ], tetrafluoroborate [BF 4 ] and bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide [Tf 2 N] from ;08C to 1058C and to 33 MPa. All of the systems studied were Type V from the classification scheme of Scott-van Konynenburg with regions of vapor-liquid equilibrium, miscible/critical regions, vapor-liquid-liquid equilibrium, and upper and lower critical endpoints (UCEP and LCEP). The effect of the alkyl chain length has been investigated, for ethyl-([EMIm]), n-butyl-([BMIm]), and n-hexyl-([HMIm]). With increasing chain length, the temperature of the lower critical end points increases and pressure at the mixture critical points decrease. With a common cation, the temperature of the LCEP increased and the mixture critical point pressures decreased in the order of [BF 4 Keywords: imidazolium ionic liquids, R-134a, global phase behavior, high-pressure, mixture critical points
IntroductionThe solubility and separation of refrigerant gases are important problems for several industries. Many refrigerants and their intermediates have very similar physical and chemical properties which can often render their separation costly by traditional distillation. The separation of the common azeotropes encountered among refrigerant mixtures usually requires additional components in extractive distillation. Ionic liquids (ILs) have been shown to provide efficient solutions to these problems.1 Absorption refrigeration with refrigerant gases uses a low-volatility solvent to first absorb the gas at low temperatures and then uses heat to liberate a highpressure gas for the refrigeration cycle. However, widespread application of absorption refrigeration has been impeded by the often bulky equipment that is needed to purify the high-pressure gas from the generator; the presence of any absorption liquid significantly decreases the efficiency. Non-volatile ILs in these systems with refrigerants may help solve these problems.
2The high-pressure phase behavior and equilibria are the most important data needed to utilize any of the novel applications with ILs and refrigerant gases. The phase behavior indicates the conditions (temperature and pressure) of the different equilibria and transitions, whether vapor-liquid, liquidliquid, etc. For instance, regions in which the IL and refrigerant are miscible would not be conducive to separations or absorption refrigeration. This study will investigate the phase behavior of a series of 1-n-alkyl-3-methyl imidazolium ILs with various alkyl groups and anions (see Figure 1.) with the