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Program performance Ever increasing amounts of refrigerants are collected annually, with more than:
The work is not over yet - there are thousands more tonnes to collect across Australia. National monthly recoveries and trend - kilograms (1993-2006)
As illustrated in the national monthly recoveries graph, the volume being returned has increased substantially since the late 1990s. This growth is anticipated to continue. National cumulative refrigerant recovery - kilograms (1993-2006) As illustrated in the national cumulative graph, the volume of recovered refrigerant has reached 1600 tonnes at the end of June 2006. This significant achievement has taken just over 13 years to achieve. The next 1000 tonnes should be collected in three years.
The majority of refrigerant taken back by RRA has been destroyed. In the early days of the program some product was reclaimed to new specification, and some was sent to the manufacturer to use as feedstock.
RRA uses the Australian developed plasma-arc technology and plant owned and operated by BCD Technologies to destroy refrigerants. This transforms fluorocarbon refrigerants to harmless salty water, with higher than 99.999% efficiency. Plasma – arc destruction plant on-site at Tottenham
Plasma-arc destruction process
Storage At the operations site in Melbourne recovered refrigerant is vaporised to remove impurities that may have a detrimental effect on the destruction plant. After cleaning, the refrigerant is transferred to bulk storage until destroyed.
Reclamation In the mid 1990s there was strong demand for some refrigerants (R12) due to their accelerated phase-out. In response RRA reclaimed some recovered product to new specifications, however, Australian Government policy now requires that all recovered refrigerant be destroyed.
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