Simulation and performance study of a two-bed adsorption cooling system operated with activated carbon-ethanol

This paper presents the transient model of a two-bed adsorption cooling system performed in the SIMULINK platform. The inlet chilled water temperature in the evaporator, temperature of cooling water and hot water temperature of the adsorbent bed and its effect on systems coefficient of performance, refrigeration effect and specific cooling power have been studied and presented. It is observed that the systems coefficient of performance is 0.57 when the inlet hot water temperature about 80 °C. In this study, the optimum cooling power and systems coefficient of performance are also determined in terms of the phase time, shifting duration and hot water inflow temperature. The results indicates that the cooling water and hot water inlet temperatures significantly affects the coefficient of performance, specific cooling power and cooling power of the system. The effect of mass flow rate on the cooler efficiency is also presented. A two bed adsorption system of capacity 13.5 kW having an evaporator and condenser temperatures of 6°C and 28°C, respectively, are considered for the present investigation. The adsorbent mass considered is 45 kg with a shifting duration of 20 sec. The result of this study gives the basis for performance optimization of a practical continuous operating vapour adsorption cooler.