Simulation of accumulated performance of a solar thermal powered adsorption refrigeration system with daily climate conditions

• Published in: Energy (Oxford) 2018-12, Vol.165, p.487-498
• Main Authors: Wang, Ji, Hu, Eric, Blazewicz, Antoni, Ezzat, Akram W.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accumulated performance; Activated carbon; Activated carbon/methanol; Adsorption; Adsorption refrigeration; Climate; Climate models; Climatic conditions; Computer simulation; Daily climate conditions; Ice removal; Meteorological data; Methanol; Refrigeration; Solar energy; Solar heating; Solar power; Thermal energy; Weather
• ISSN: 0360-5442; 1873-6785
• DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2018.09.080

Accumulated performance of an activated carbon/methanol adsorption refrigeration system driven by solar thermal energy, has been studied under various climate conditions. The previous studies mainly focus on the individual daily cycle with the assumption that the system restores back to its original point every day, regardless of a real climate condition. In reality, for such a refrigeration system, its daily performance would depend not only on the current day's weather conditions, but also on the previous day's situation, i.e. the current day cycle starts from where the previous day cycle ends, which is not necessarily the starting point of the previous day. There might be some leftover liquid at the end of a particular day, depending on the weather conditions during the night. A new configuration, which can accumulate the cooling capacity without removing ice daily, has been established. Possible cycles of such a system have been identified with consideration of realistic daily climate conditions. A desktop case-study was conducted to demonstrate the difference in the simulation of accumulated performance by two models, with the ideal assumption and real daily weather data respectively. The ice-making performance and COPs simulated by two models have been compared and evaluated in this study. •New configuration for accumulating daily performance has been established.•Possible realistic following-day cycles have been identified.•Diverse equations for cycles with weather situations have been proposed.•The difference of cooling performance simulated by two models has been revealed.