Zinc Bromide As Working Fluids in Solar Absorption Cooling System
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Basrah Journal of Engineering Sciences, Vol. 20, No. 1, (2020), 23-29 Basrah Journal of Engineering Sciences Journal homepage: www.bjes.edu.iq ISSN (Online): 23118385, ISSN (Print): 18146120 Acetone - Zinc Bromide as Working Fluids in Solar Absorption Cooling System Nabeel A. Ghyadh 1,*, Salman H. Hammadi 2, Haroun A. K. Shahad 3 1Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Kufa, Najaf, Iraq 2Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Basrah, Basrah, Iraq 3Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Babylon, Babylon, Iraq E-mail address: [email protected] , [email protected] Received: 20 October 2019; Accepted: 11 December 2019; Published: 2 February 2020 Abstract Solar energy serves as a good replacement to traditional source of energy such oil and natural gas. The problem of In the present research, experimental and theoretical work is using conventional source of energy; oil and natural gas; is carried out using ecofriendly refrigeration as working fluid in the absorption system. The working pair is considered in the the emission of greenhouse gases, while solar energy do not analysis, namely, acetone and zinc bromide. The system is provoke the greenhouse gases making it safer to environment designed to work under outdoor conditions in Hila city-Iraq. In compared to fossil fuels [1]. the test, the outdoor conditions are varied and the hot water is Conventionally, heat pumps and refrigerators are used as heat source. To check the performance of the system, assembled using the vapor compression cycle. The use of various operating conditions are included in this study. These vapor compression cycles is dominant, though on rare varied conditions include heat source, absorber, condenser, occasions, absorption cycles are used in commercial heating and evaporator temperatures. The system is tested during ventilation and air conditioning systems, where large September 2019. The results show that the COP of the quantities of inexpensive or waste heat are available. In the absorption cooling system ranged from 0.13 to 0.487, while the temperature drop in evaporator is 16 °C. Condensation and vapor compression cycles, the operation of compressor absorption temperatures are under 41 °C, while the maximum depends on the mechanical work. On the other hand, the temperature of the driving water is 80 °C. The steady-state compressors in the absorption cycles rely on thermos model is analyzed by using EES program. Energy and mass chemical process in their operations [2]. The refrigerant- balance achieved on absorption system to predict some absorption solution is often used in the absorption parameters such as temperature, pressure and (COP) to refrigeration systems as the working fluid but not pure compare it with the measured parameters. The results of the refrigerant is used in such systems. The aim of the absorbent model satisfied the experimental results for temperatures as well in these systems which is considered as a secondary fluid is as the coefficient of performance. The results also show that the to absorb the primary fluid. Primary fluid in this case is in the generator temperature had a great effect on the system performance. vapor phase. The absorption refrigeration systems widely use ammonia-water (NH3/H2O) solution with ammonia as the © 2020 The Authors. Published by the University of Basrah. Open-access refrigerant and water-lithium bromide (H2O/LiBr) solution article. with water as the refrigerant [3]. In the vapor absorption refrigeration systems, since the Keywords: Acetone-Zinc bromide pair, Vapor absorption cooling properties of the working fluid play important role in the system, Coefficient of performance. performance of the cycles, the working fluid should be chosen carefully. Many researchers have put a significant 1. Introduction effort in this area of research in the recent years [4]. Two substances are used as working fluid in the absorption Research over the past few decades has focused on the refrigeration cycles. One of these substances act as utilization of renewable energies. Solar energy is distributed refrigerant, and the other act as absorbent. The solution on the surface of the earth and reaches everyone without the consists of primary and secondary fluids having good need to transfer and distribute it, which is practical in terms absorption properties at temperature up to 40 °C and these of its use and can be switched to other types of energy, such two fluids are separated at 50 °C. The working solution is as thermal energy, mechanical, and electrical. Using solar required to have the following conditions: energy has many advantages. Firstly, it is also a clean source of energy which means causing no harm on the environment. The physical and thermal properties of the working fluids Secondly, the solar systems are easy to be used and operated. must be stable and the chemical compositions of these Finally, it is considered a sustainable source of energy fluids must be compatible. making it not to be subjected to monopoly of companies or It is necessary to assure that the working solution is not investors, but can benefit all the inhabitants of the earth. toxic neither has ability to explode. The viscosity is required to be low. Copyright © 2020 Authors. This is an open-access article distributed under the creative commons attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium provided the original work is properly cited. N. A. Ghyadh et al. / Basrah Journal of Engineering Sciences, Vol. 20, No. 1, (2020), 23-29 24 The heat of vaporization of the refrigerant must be high. solution. Therefore, in our research we will make a The specific heat capacity is necessary to be low. comparison of the working pair solution mentioned above For economic purposes, the cost is reasonable. and the system is fabricated and tested at Babylon University site in Hila city-Iraq (32.4° latitude, 44.4° longitude). Riffat et al. [5] investigated the absorption and desorption of two types of working pair solutions. The first solution is 2. Solution Properties water-potassium and the other solution is water-lithium bromide. It was noticed that the water-lithium bromide have The working solution that is used in this work is acetone- lower desorption rates than that of water potassium. They ZnBr2. To perform theoretical and experimental study on the reported that the required energy is decreased and therefore absorption refrigerant system, the thermodynamic properties the efficiency is enhanced as the desorption rate is increased. of the working solution as well as the system working It is coming to the conclusion that using water-potassium as a conditions must be known. Properties such as temperature, working solution is better than water-lithium bromide. They pressure, density, concentration, and enthalpy are necessary justified their conclusion from the fact that the water- in the experimental and theoretical work. For acetone-ZnBr2 potassium has less corrosive properties, less expensive and absorption refrigeration cycles, Acetone is the refrigerant, environmentally friendly compared to water lithium bromide. ZnBr2 is absorbent. The thermodynamic properties at the IERRA et al. [6] studied a solar energy as an energy generator output to absorber input as depicted in Fig. 1 are source in various refrigeration applications, especially in calculated. The acetone properties can be collected from data refrigeration machines absorbency. Experiments were carried of ESS program, while other properties are conducted from out on a laboratory model of an absorption refrigeration binary mixture of acetone-ZnBr2 solution and can be obtained machine operating on the NH3‐H2O solution. The machine from the following equations: gave a cooling temperature of less than 2 °C at a temperature of the generator 73 °C, while the performance ∑ ∑ factor cop reached for the machine range (24-28) % [1, 2]. Sabah Abdul Ameer [7] designed and fabricated a continuous solar absorption refrigeration system. The experimental system was tested under Iraqi weather ∑ ∑ conditions at Babylon province at 32.39° N latitudes and 44.39° E longitudes. Two pairs of working fluid were tested namely, lithium bromide-water and diethyl ether-ethanol. The The temperature (T) is in (°C), and (x) in (kg zinc theoretical and experimental coefficient of performance of bromide/kg solution) % [11]. the absorption system for two pairs and at different solution Table 1 Coefficients for calculation of the vapor pressure of the solution concentrations are (0.31-0.72) for lithium bromide/water and acetone-zinc bromide with the Eq. 1. (0.6-0.82) for Diethyl Ether/Ethanol. The steady-state model and dynamic model were analyzed by using linking between a00 -2.41 E+0 a10 5.35 E-2 a20 -2.13 E-4 Matlab software and EES program. The results of the model a01 1.72 E-2 a11 -1.16 E-4 a21 3.66 E-6 satisfied the experimental results for temperatures and a02 -5.58 E-4 a12 2.38 E-6 a22 -4.61 E-8 pressure as well as the coefficient of performance. Pilatowsky et al. [8] suggested the working solution Table 2 Coefficients for calculation of the specific enthalpy of the liquid monomethylamine-water to run the plant at low temperatures solution of acetone-zinc bromide with the Eq. 2. of 60-80 °C. The operating characteristic of the plant with a00 176.64 E+0 a10 -2.95 E+0 this new working solution were analyzed and discussed a 1.892 E+0 a -1.31 E-2 theoretically, obtaining evaporation temperatures from 01 11 a -1.616 E-4 a 2.8735 E-5 – 5 °C to 10 °C and COP from 0.05 to 0.55 at desorption 02 12 temperature of 60 °C. However, the disadvantage of this a03 1.486 E-5 a13 -5.02 E-7 solution is that the COP is low and a rectification for the a04 -2.439 E-8 a14 1.755 E-9 vapor produced in the generator is required.