1.1 Natural Refrigeration:: Performance Study On Vars by Using Libr-Water As A Refrigerant
1.1 Natural Refrigeration:: Performance Study On Vars by Using Libr-Water As A Refrigerant
1.1 Natural Refrigeration:: Performance Study On Vars by Using Libr-Water As A Refrigerant
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Refrigeration is the process of removing heat from an enclosed space or from a substance
for the purpose of lowering the temperature. Before mechanical refrigeration systems were
introduced, ancient people, including the Greeks and the Romans, cooled their food with ice
transported from the mountains. Wealthy families made use of snow cellars, pits that were dug into
the ground and insulated with wood and straw, to store the ice. In this manner, packed snow and
ice could be preserved for months. Stored ice was the principal means of refrigeration until the
beginning of the 20th century, and it is still used in some areas. Basically, there are two ways with
which refrigeration can be achieved:
1. Natural Refrigeration.
2. Artificial Refrigeration.
1.1 Natural Refrigeration:
In olden days, natural means achieved refrigeration with the use of ice and evaporative
cooling.
In earlier times, the ice was
Transported from colder regions
Harvested in winter and stored for use
Made during the night by Radiative cooling
1.1.1 Nocturnal Ice Making:
In India before the invention of artificial refrigeration technology, ice making by nocturnal
cooling was common. The apparatus consisted of a shallow ceramic tray with a thin layer of water,
placed outdoors with a clear exposure to the night sky. The bottom and sides were insulated with
a thick layer of hay. On a clear night the water would lose heat by radiation upwards. Provided
the air was calm and not too far above freezing, heat gain from the surrounding air by convection
would be low enough to allow the water to freeze by dawn.
1.1.2 Evaporative Cooling:
Reduction in temperature resulting from the evaporation of a liquid, which removes latent
heat from the surface from which evaporation takes place. This process is employed in industrial
and domestic cooling systems, and is also the physical basis of sweating. In India during olden
times, Water was cooled by this method by keeping it in earthen pots, in which the water would
evaporate through minute pores and thus cool it.
Evaporation:
The low pressure, low temperature refrigerant enters the evaporator, which is in contact
with the cold reservoir. Because a low pressure is maintained, the refrigerant is able to boil at a
low temperature. So, the liquid absorbs heat from the cold reservoir and evaporates. The refrigerant
leaves the evaporator as a low temperature, low pressure gas and is taken into the compressor
again, back at the beginning of the cycle. From the fig 1.2 the process 5-1 shows Evaporation.
The fig 1.3 shows a Vapour Absorption Refrigeration system, the vapour absorption refrigeration
system comprises of a generator, an absorber, an evaporator and a condenser. In the vapour
absorption system, the refrigerant used is ammonia, water or lithium bromide. The refrigerant
produces cooling effect in the evaporator and releases the heat to the atmosphere via the condenser.
The absorber and the generator perform a function similar to that of the compressor in the Vapour
Compression cycle. The absorbent enables the flow of the refrigerant from the absorber to the
generator. Another major difference is the method in which the energy input is given to the system.
In the vapour compression system, the energy input is given in the form of the mechanical work
from the electric motor. In the vapour absorption system, the energy input is given in the form of
the heat.
The absorption cooling cycle takes place in three phases:
Evaporation:
A liquid refrigerant evaporates in a low partial pressure environment, thus extracting heat
from its surroundings (e.g. the refrigerator's compartment). Because of the low partial pressure, the
temperature needed for evaporation is also low.
Absorption:
The new gaseous refrigerant is absorbed by another liquid (e.g. a salt solution).
Regeneration:
The refrigerant-saturated liquid is heated, causing the refrigerant to evaporate out. The hot
gaseous refrigerant passes through a heat exchanger, transferring its heat outside the system (such
as to surrounding ambient-temperature air), and condenses. The condensed (liquid) refrigerant
supplies the evaporation phase.
Chapter 2
REFRIGERANT
A refrigerant is a substance or mixture, usually a fluid, used in a heat pump and refrigeration
cycle. In most of the cycles it undergoes phase change from liquid to gas or gas to liquid. It could
also be termed as a chemical used in cooling mechanism, such as an air conditioner or refrigerator,
as the heat is carried it changes phase and completes the refrigeration cycle. Most common
refrigerants used are chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s) but they are being phased out as the degrade the
environment.
2.1 Ammonia
Ammonia has been used as a refrigerant since the 19th century. All those who are involved
in food preservation and industrial process plants know ammonia as refrigerant of choice due to its
unmatched thermodynamic properties. Anhydrous ammonia is a clear liquid that boils at a
temperature of -33°C. In refrigeration systems, the liquid is stored in closed containers under
pressure. When the pressure is released, the liquid evaporates rapidly, generally forming an
invisible vapour or gas. The rapid evaporation causes the temperature of the liquid to drop until it
reaches the normal boiling point. A similar effect occurs when water evaporates off the skin, thus
cooling it. Therefore, ammonia is used in refrigeration systems.
Ammonia cannot be used as a refrigerant when copper is used in the test rig because in the
presence of water ammonia becomes ammonium hydroxide and this reacts with Copper to form
cupric oxide. Common metals are not affected by anhydrous ammonia but even a little water or
moisture will cause ammonia to react with copper and corrode it. Ammonia is highly poisonous
to human beings so it may cause a health hazard. Filling of ammonia requires a highly skilled
operator and to operate at high pressure the system must be leak proof [1].
2.2 Lithium-Bromide:
Lithium Bromide (Li-Br) consists of certain percentages of Lithium and Bromine. Lithium
is a soft, light, silver-white, highly reactive metallic element of the group 1 from the periodic table
with atomic number 3 whereas Bromine is a chemical element belonging to the halogen category
with atomic number 35, and is the third lightest halogen. It has a fuming red-brown color at room
temperatures which can evaporate readily at ease. But Lithium-Bromide is a mixture of both
lithium and bromine which is white in color and has a bitter taste which is completely soluble in
water, alcohol, and glycol. It is used as an operating medium in air conditioners and refrigerators
due to its hygroscopic property. It is also used for sedation and has a hypnotic characteristic used
for brazing and welding fluxes [2].
In a Lithium Bromide-Water vapour absorption refrigeration system, water is used as the
refrigerant while Lithium Bromide (LiBr) is used as the absorbent. In the absorber, the lithium
bromide absorbs the water refrigerant, creating a solution of Water and Lithium Bromide. This
solution is pumped by the pump to the generator where the solution is heated. The water refrigerant
gets vaporized and moves to the condenser where it is cooled while the Lithium Bromide flows
back to the absorber where it further absorbs water coming from the evaporator.
Some Special features of the LiBr-Water combination used a refrigerant:
1) The water used as the refrigerant in the absorption refrigeration system means the operating
pressures in the condenser and the evaporator must be very low. Even the difference of
pressure between the condenser and the evaporator must be very low. This can be achieved
even without installing the expansion valve in the system, since the drop-in pressure occurs
due to friction in the refrigeration piping and in the spray nozzles.
2) The capacity of any absorption refrigeration system depends on the ability of the absorbent
to absorb the refrigerant, which in turn depends on the concentration of the absorbent. To
increase the capacity of the system, the concentration of absorbent should be increased, which
would enable absorption of more refrigerant. Some of the most common methods used to
change the concentration of the absorbent are: controlling the flow of the steam or hot water
to the generator, controlling the flow of water used for condensing in the condenser, and re-
concentrating the absorbent leaving the generator and entering the absorber.
Lithium bromide has great affinity for water vapour, however, when the water-lithium bromide
solution is formed, they are not completely soluble with each other under all the operating
conditions of the absorption refrigeration system. Because of this, the designer must take care
that such conditions would not be created where crystallization and precipitation of the lithium
bromide would occur [2].
Chapter 3
LITERATURE SURVEY
This Chapter involves the survey of research made by different researchers on VARS using various
refrigerants to understand the concept of a system and to work on the same to get better
performance if possible.
Here are a few papers we referred to,
Mohd Aziz et al. conducted an experiment on Design of vapour absorption Refrigeration system
in a industry which utilizes steam turbine exhaust gas which contains high amount of thermal
energy, the main objective was to make a hypothetical design of the vapour absorption refrigeration
system using waste energy. Lithium bromide-water as a refrigerant was selected because it could
be driven by gas, solar, geothermal energy which could help in substantially reducing the carbon
dioxide emissions and use water as it was abundantly available and cheap. The work input of the
pump was neglected as compared to the heat input. Results show that COP minutely increased with
the increase in generator and evaporator temperature, this depends largely on the enthalpy
difference between the chilled water at inlet and outlet of evaporator. On the contrary it causes a
loss of exergy in components which contributes a major role in calculating the efficiency [3].
drops when the spray density is increased. Therefore, to select an appropriate spray density is
important in the practical design of an absorption machine [4].
G. A. Florides et al. conducted an experiment which involved the design and construction of Li-
br–water absorption machine, main objective was to find the difference between the absorber LiBr
inlet and outlet percentage ratio, the coefficient of performance of the unit in relation to the
generator temperature, the efficiency of the unit in relation to the solution heat exchanger area and
the solution strength effectiveness in relation to the absorber solution outlet temperature are
examined. Single pass, vertical tube heat exchangers had been used for the absorber and for the
evaporator. The solution heat exchanger was designed as a single pass annular heat exchanger. The
condenser and the generator were designed using horizontal tube heat exchangers. The analysis
shows that the greater the difference between the absorber LiBr inlet and outlet percentage ratios
is, the smaller will be the mass circulating in the absorber. To keep the cycle running at a specified
stage, the temperature at the exit of the absorber has to be maintained at a lower level when the
absorber exit LiBr percentage ratio is lower. Considering that the pressures and temperatures at
other points of the unit are kept constant, the COP of the unit is lowered when the generator
temperature is increased, leading to an increase of the generator pressure. The solution heat
exchanger increases the efficiency of the unit. The greater the heat exchanger area, the greater its
effect is. Finally, when checking the solution strength effectiveness for a constant difference of 6%
between the absorber inlet LiBr percentage ratio and absorber outlet ratio, it was found that a
smaller percentage ratio in LiBr solutions would have slightly better results. A reasonable
temperature at the exit of the absorber would be around 30 ºC [5].
is increased by 35ºC and 0.08 with the increase in evaporator temperature of 6ºC. The heat load on
the generator increases by 3002.3kJ/kg as the condenser temperature increased by 15ºC and
1731.3kJ/kg as absorber temperature increased by 15ºC. The increase in the generator heat load
decreases the C.O.P value by 0.38, when the condenser temperature is increased by 15ºC and 0.23
when the absorber temperature is increased by 15ºC. Thus this analysis provides that the operating
temperatures of condenser and absorber has to be maintained less than 40ºC, evaporator
temperature has to be more than 10ºc and the generator temperature not exceeding 85ºC so as to
run the absorption system efficiently during the utilization of heat from the waste
flue gases and provide cooling effect in the boiler control room and therefore conserving the energy
[6].
Neeraj Kumar et al. conducted an experiment which involved the design and construction of a
Solar Vapour Absorption System using Li-br–water. Aim of the experiment was to develop a
model which could predict the COP of the system which could run on solar energy. The heat was
supplied to generator by solar collector which heated water running through the generator, herby
heating the refrigerant. The Paper states that with the increase in generator and evaporator
temperature the COP increases significantly, as the condenser temperature drops it causes less heat
transfer in the condenser which causes a increase in enthalpy of refrigerant at condenser outlet, this
causes decreases in cooling capacity indirectly affecting the COP. Further conduction of tests
indicated that the temperature range of 65°C to 80°C was suitable to get absorption system work
efficiently with increased performance [7].
capacity of the storage tank. The minimum required collector area was about 57.6 m2, which could
supply the cooling loads for the sunshine hours of the design day for July. The operation of the
system has also been considered after sunset by saving solar energy [8].
S. Alizadeh et al. conducted an experiment which involved the design and optimization of an
absorption refrigeration system operated by solar vapour, this experiment was conducted with a
fixed evaporator temperature to compare the two cycles of ammonia water system and lithium-
bromide water system. Results show that the water-lithium bromide system is simpler than the
ammonia-water system and it operates at a higher cooling ratio (ratio of energy removed from the
surroundings during the refrigeration phase to that supplied to generator during regeneration phase)
and heat exchanger parameter for the same conditions. Paper states that as the generator
temperature increases beyond a point the condenser and absorber temperature decreases [9].
Chapter 4
METHODOLOGY & OBJECTIVES
This chapter includes the objectives, scope and the methodology involved in the construction of
the test rig
4.1 OBJECTIVES
To develop a vapour absorption refrigeration test rig for study purposes
To study the performance using LiBr-Water solution
To conduct a repeatability test to find a deviation in COP
4.2 METHODOLOGY
A review was made from the above-mentioned research papers and it is found out that
construction of a LiBr-water vapour absorption test rig is viable option and is more efficient in
terms of performance in comparison of ammonia. Based on this review a VARS test rig was
constructed. The Refrigerant to be used has a concentration of 55% LiBr and 45% water. Using a
refrigerant with higher concentration of LiBr in the solution will clog the tubing because of
crystallisation where as increasing the concentration of water will raise the temperature of
evaporation of the refrigerant in the generator. The tests were conducted on three separate days
across three weeks.
Steps in Construction
1) Literature survey has been done and specifications of various components have been
listed down.
2) Using the specifications of components, the test rig should be assembled.
3) Using refrigerant of concentration of 55% LiBr and 45% water, experimentation has to be
carried out.
4) Experiment is to be conducted using LiBr-water solution as the refrigerant, three separate
days for 70 minutes each and readings should be taken at an interval of 10 minutes.
5) Temperature v/s Time graph has to be plotted according to the readings.
6) Various COP’s have to be plotted against time.
4.3 SCOPE
Design of a smaller vapour absorption refrigeration unit for academic purposes.
Study of Lithium Bromide-water as a refrigerant used in the test rig.
Chapter 5
EXPERIMENTAL TEST RIG AND PROCEDURE
This chapter deals with the various parts that have been used in building the test rig and also the
procedure followed to carry out the experiment. The material of tubing used for the test rig was
copper where as the material of the generator and absorber is Stainless steel.
5.1 Complete test rig:
A complete test rig of vapour absorption refrigeration system was constructed by
assembling all the components. This assembly is used to conduct experiments using LiBr-Water
as our refrigerant, Fig 5.1, plate 5.2 and plate 5.1 show the final assembly of the VARS test rig.
Plate 5.1 Front view of the test rig Plate 5.2 Rear view of the test rig
5.2 Generator:
The purpose of the generator is to deliver the refrigerant vapour to the rest of the system. It
accomplishes this by separating the water (refrigerant) from the lithium bromide and water
solution. In the generator, a high-temperature energy source, typically steam or hot water, flows
through tubes that are immersed in a dilute solution of refrigerant and absorbent. The solution
absorbs heat from the warmer steam or water, causing the refrigerant to boil (vaporize) and separate
from the absorbent solution. As the refrigerant is boiled away, the absorbent solution becomes
more concentrated. The concentrated absorbent solution returns to the absorber and the refrigerant
vapour migrates to the condenser. Material of generator box is stainless steel and the generator
used is shown below in Plate 5.3.
Parameter Value
Tube dimension Inside diameter Di =6.35mm
Outside diameter Do = 6.8 mm
Height 130 mm
Length 180 mm
Width 150 mm
Generator pressure 7.35 kPa
5.3 Evaporator:
The purpose of evaporator is to cool the circulating water. The evaporator contains a bundle
of tubes that carry the system water to be cooled/chilled. High pressure liquid condensate
(refrigerant) is throttled down to the evaporator pressure.
At this low pressure, the refrigerant absorbs heat from the circulating water and evaporates.
The refrigerant vapours thus formed tend to increase the pressure in the vessel. This will in turn
increase the boiling temperature and the desired cooling effect will not be obtained. So, it is
necessary to remove the refrigerant vapours from the vessel into the lower pressure absorber.
Physically, the evaporator and absorber are contained inside the same shell, allowing refrigerant
vapours generated in the evaporator to migrate continuously to the absorber as shown in Plate 5.4
Parameter Value
Tube dimension; Inside diameter Di=3.175mm
Height 210 mm
Diameter 190 mm
Area 182055 mm2
5.4 Condenser:
The purpose of condenser is to condense the refrigerant vapours. Inside the condenser, cooling
water flows through tubes and the hot refrigerant vapour fills the surrounding space. As heat
transfers from the refrigerant vapour to the water, refrigerant condenses on the tube surfaces. The
condensed liquid refrigerant collects in the bottom of the condenser before traveling to the
expansion device. Condenser is made up of mild steel as shown in Plate 5.5. There are lot of fins
provided
Parameter Value
Tube dimension; Inside Di= 3.175 mm
diameter
5.5 Absorber:
Inside the absorber, the refrigerant vapour is absorbed by the lithium bromide solution. As
the refrigerant vapour is absorbed, it condenses from a vapour to a liquid, releasing the heat it
acquired in the evaporator.
The absorption process creates a lower pressure within the absorber. This lower pressure,
along with the absorbent’s affinity for water, induces a continuous flow of refrigerant vapour from
the evaporator. In addition, the absorption process condenses the refrigerant vapours and releases
the heat removed from the evaporator by the refrigerant. As the concentrated solution absorbs more
and more refrigerant; its absorption ability decreases. The weak absorbent solution is then pumped
to the generator where heat is used to drive off the refrigerant. The hot refrigerant vapours created
in the generator migrate to the condenser. The condenser turns the refrigerant vapours to a liquid
state and picks up the heat of condensation, which it rejects to air. The liquid refrigerants return to
the evaporator and completes the cycle. The material used for making absorber is iron, copper pipe
is folded inside the absorber shell as shown in Plate 5.6.
Parameters Value
Tube dimension; Outside diameter Do = 6.8 mm
Length 170 mm
Height 180 mm
Width 130 mm
Volume 4000000 mm3
pressure (condenser) and low-pressure (evaporator) sides of the refrigeration system by creating a
liquid seal that separates the high-pressure and low pressure sides of the cycle. As the high-pressure
liquid refrigerant flows through the expansion device, it causes a pressure drop that reduces the
refrigerant pressure to that of the evaporator. This pressure reduction causes a small portion of the
liquid refrigerant to boil off, cooling the remaining refrigerant to the desired evaporator
temperature. The cooled mixture of liquid and vapour refrigerant then flows into the evaporator.
The material used for making capillary tube is copper. The length of capillary tube is 6m. And the
diameter of Capillary tube is 0.3mm.
5.7 Connectors:
Copper connectors are used to connect the capillary tube in between generator and absorber
which helps in increasing the pressure and reducing temperature of refrigerant after it passes
through the expansion valve. A connector is shown in Plate 5.7.
5.8 Pump:
It is used to pump the solution of lithium bromide and water from absorber to the generator.
It is driven by current supplied by the battery. Only one pump is used to pump our refrigerant into
the generator from the absorber as shown in Plate 5.8.
Pressure head = 2m, Power = DC 12V
Plate 5.9 One-way pressure gauge for VARS Plate 5.10 Two-way pressure gauge for VARS
5.11 Valves:
Valves are used to control and regulate the flow throughout the VARS cycle. It is used to
connect the various components through copper pipes. These valves are used as connections
between the generator and absorber to which the pump is connected. The valves are mounted on a
¼ inch copper tube which is used to regulate the flow of refrigerant through the pipes. Valves like
these are installed as an inlet and outlet to the absorber and the valves used are shown in Plate 5.12
5.13 Heater:
Heater of 1000W capacity is used to heat the refrigerant, the heater is kept adjacent to the
generator which imparts heat to the generator, increasing temperature of refrigerant inside the
generator. A dimmer stat is used to control the voltage output of the heater so as to control the
temperature. The plate 5.15 shows heater involved in our experiment and plate 5.16 shows the
dimmer stat.
Chapter 6
RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
This chapter involves tabulation and calculation of the actual, theoretical, relative COP’s. Results
are compared based on the three trials taken for the repeatability test.
The test used a refrigerant mixture having a 55% LiBr-45% Water concentration and were
conducted on three different days, across three weeks in the same month. The test duration was 70
minutes and the readings were taken at an interval of 10 minutes.
6.1 Experimental Observation:
The Following Temperature readings were taken for 70 mins with a time interval of 10 mins on
4th May 2017 at 12:00 PM.
Table 6.1 Temperature readings for test conducted with time interval 10 mins on Day 1 of experimentation.
Calculations:
At Time 70 mins
1) Mass flow rate of weak solution, mws = 0.01 kg/s
2) Mass fraction of weak solution, ws = 0.55
At pressure of 37mmHg and 74.1C,
Mass fraction of strong solution, ws =0.58
3) Circulation Ratio ()
0.55
= ws /ss -ws = 0.58−0.55 = 18.33
where,
ws = Mass fraction of weak solution
COPa = 0.60
𝑇𝑒 𝑇𝑔−𝑇𝑎
2) Theoretical Coefficient of Performance, COPth = (𝑇𝑐−𝑇𝑒) ( )
𝑇𝑔
274.3 347.23−311.53
= (305.93−274.43) ( )
347.23
= COPth = 0.93
COP a
3) Relative Coefficient of Performance, COPr = COP th
0.60
= 0.93
COPr = 0.64
75
Time v/s Temperature
73
71
69
67
65
63
61
59
57
55
Temperature
53
51
49
47
45
43
41
39
37
35
33
31
29
27
25
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
Time(mins)
The fig 6.2 shows different COP’s of the system with respect to time, it is observed that as time
progresses the theoretical COP calculated is within the range of 0.92-0.98 whereas the actual and
relative COP’s had a steady increase.
The Following Temperature readings were taken for 70 mins with a time interval of 10 mins on
13th May 2017 at 12:00 PM.
Table 6.2 Temperature readings for test conducted with time interval 10 mins on 10th day of experimentation.
54
52
50
48
46
44
42
40
38
36
34
32
30
28
26
24
22
20
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
Time(mins)
Generator(°C) Inlet Generator(°C) Outlet Generator(°C) Inside Condenser Out(°C)
Evaporator(°C) Inlet Evaporator(°C) Outlet Evaporator(°C) Inside
Figure 6.3 shows temperature readings of the system with respect to time, It is observed that as
generator temperature increases the evaporator inlet and inside temperature decreases.
The maximum condenser temperature was 34℃ at 70 minutes, and the temperature inside the
evaporator was 30.9℃ for the same time. The highest actual COP obtained for this day was 0.6
0.8
COP
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
Time(mins)
The Following Temperature readings were taken for 70 mins with a time interval of 10 mins on
22nd May 2017 at 12:00 PM.
Table 6.3 Temperature readings for test conducted with time interval 10 mins on the 19th day of experimentation.
54
52
50
48
46
44
42
40
38
36
34
32
30
28
26
24
22
20
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
Time(mins)
Generator(°C) Inlet Generator(°C) Outlet Generator(°C) Inside
Condenser Out (°C) Evaporator(°C) Inlet Evaporator(°C) Outlet
Evaporator(°C) Inside
decreases. The highest actual COP obtained for this day was 0.61 and for this reading water was
cooled till 30.2°C.
0.8
COP
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
0 3 6 9 12 15 18 21 24 27 30 33 36 39 42 45 48 51 54 57 60 63 66 69 72 75
Time(mins)
0.6
0.5
0.4
COP
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Time(mins)
Comparing the Theoretical COP’s of the experiments conducted for 3 different days,
0.8
COP
0.6
0.4
0.2
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Time(mins)
Comparing the Relative COP’s of the experiments conducted for 3 different days,
0.3
0.2
0.1
0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Time(mins)
The maximum deviation of relative COP is at 70 minutes i.e. 3.1% and minimum deviation of
relative COP at 30 minutes i.e. 10.7%. Relative COP is the ratio of actual COP and theoretical
COP. Actual COP increases with time and thus relative COP increases
6.3 APPLICATION:
1. India is among the world leaders in agricultural production however much of our produce
goes waste due to absence of proper storage facilities. Refrigeration is thus vitally important
for our country.
2. To keep the milk production up and to keep milk fresh in rural areas refrigeration is needed.
3. Medical facilities are also adversely affected due to break in the cold chain as the medicines
move from the production zone to the rural areas. So, there is need of refrigeration for
medicines.
4. Usage of CFCs affect the environment adversely. So, to prevent our environment getting
affected by CFCs, we must think about some alternate process. And there is only one
replacement of this serious problem. Consumption of electricity is less compared to VCR.
Chapter 7
COST ANALYSIS
CONCLUSION
Repeatability tests conducted on the test rig show that the test rig operates under VARS
parameters and can be used for academic purposes to better understand the working of
VARS on a large scale.
The deviation for theoretical COP was found to be 6%-8% and that of actual COP to be
1%-9%. The deviation for relative COP was found to be around 3%-11%.
The highest theoretical COP obtained was 0.99 at a generator temperature of 74.8ºC, the
highest actual COP obtained was 0.61 for the same generator temperature and the highest
relative COP obtained was 0.65.
APPENDIX
where,
ws = Mass fraction of weak solution
ss = Mass fraction of strong solution
5) Mass flowrate of Refrigerant, mws = (1+) x m
0.01 = (1+27.5) x m
m = 3.5 x 10-4 kg/s
6) Mass flow rate of strong solution, mss = m
=27.5 x 3.5 x 10-4
=9.64 x 10-3 kg/s
7) Enthalpy of super heated vapour
Temperature Tg = 65.2C
Enthalpy, h1 = 2501 + 1.88 (Tg - Tref ) Tref = 0
= 2501 + 1.88(65.2)
h1 = 2623.57 KJ/kg
COPa = 0.53
𝑇𝑒 𝑇𝑔−𝑇𝑎
15) Theoretical Coefficient of Performance, COPth = (𝑇𝑐−𝑇𝑒) ( )
𝑇𝑔
273.73 338.33−304.43
= (303.23−273.73) ( )
338.33
= COPth = 0.92
COP a
16) Relative Coefficient of Performance, COPr = COP th
0.53
= 0.92
COPr = 0.58
Calculations for Trial 3:
At Time 10 mins
1) Mass flow rate of weak solution, mws = 0.01 kg/s
2) Mass fraction of weak solution, ws = 0.55
At pressure of 34 mmHg and 65.4C,
3) Mass fraction of strong solution, ss =0.57
4) Circulation Ratio ()
0.55
= ws /ss -ws = 0.58−0.55 = 27.5
where,
ws = Mass fraction of weak solution
ss = Mass fraction of strong solution
5) Mass flowrate of Refrigerant, mws = (1+) x m
0.01 = (1+27.5) x m
m = 3.5 x 10-4 kg/s
6) Mass flow rate of strong solution, mss = m
=27.5 x 3.5 x 10-4
=9.625 x 10-3 kg/s
7) Enthalpy of super heated vapour
Temperature Tg = 65.4C
Enthalpy, h1 = 2501 + 1.88 (Tg - Tref ) Tref = 0
= 2501 + 1.88(65.4)
h1 = 2623.95 KJ/kg
COPa = 0.51
𝑇𝑒 𝑇𝑔−𝑇𝑎
15) Theoretical Coefficient of Performance, COPth = (𝑇𝑐−𝑇𝑒) ( 𝑇𝑔
)
273.53 338.53−304.73
= ( )( )
304.23−273.53 338.53
= COPth = 0.88
COP a
16) Relative Coefficient of Performance, COPr = COP th
0.51
= 0.88
COPr = 0.57
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