Performance evaluation of a solar-driven adsorption desalination-cooling system

Abstract Problems of energy and fresh water shortage become hard challenges facing survival of the human beings. Egypt especially is facing increasing of water supply challenges due to population growth. In this study, a new proposed solar adsorption desalination-cooling (ADC) system is designed, built, and tested under Egypt's climate conditions. A commercially available silica gel of about 13.5 kg is used. The Adsorption characteristics of the selected silica gel-water pair are evaluated firstly to design the proposed system. In addition, a theoretical dynamic model is developed to predict the system performance. A good agreement is found between the theoretical and experimental results under different Egypt climate conditions. The results show that, the average specific cooling power is 112 W/kg and average specific daily water production is 4 m 3 per ton silica gel with a COP of 0.45. Based on the obtained results, ADC system driven by solar energy proven to be an adequate solution to offer proper alternative to the traditional desalination systems and have promising future in Egypt's climate. However, studies about improving the performance of such system and new designs are still needed.

[1]  Kyaw Thu,et al.  Life-cycle cost analysis of adsorption cycles for desalination , 2010 .

[2]  J. Kiplagat,et al.  Adsorption Equilibrium of Water on Silica Gel , 2008 .

[3]  Kim Choon Ng,et al.  Experimental investigation on activated carbon–ethanol pair for solar powered adsorption cooling applications , 2008 .

[4]  Akiyoshi Sakoda,et al.  FUNDAMENTAL STUDY ON SOLAR POWERED ADSORPTION COOLING SYSTEM , 1984 .

[5]  Ahmed A. Askalany,et al.  Experimental study on adsorption–desorption characteristics of granular activated carbon/R134a pair , 2012 .

[6]  K. Harby,et al.  An overview on adsorption cooling systems powered by waste heat from internal combustion engine , 2015 .

[7]  Bidyut Baran Saha,et al.  Adsorption isotherms and kinetics of activated carbon/Difluoroethane adsorption pair: Theory and experiments , 2016 .

[8]  Douglas M. Ruthven,et al.  Fundamentals of Adsorption Equilibrium and Kinetics in Microporous Solids , 2006 .

[9]  S. S. Murthy,et al.  Solar Driven Adsorption Desalination System , 2014 .

[10]  Ahmed A. Askalany,et al.  Recycling brine water of reverse osmosis desalination employing adsorption desalination: A theoretical simulation , 2017 .

[11]  E. Hu.  A study of thermal decomposition of methanol in solar powered adsorption refrigeration systems , 1998 .

[12]  Takao Kashiwagi,et al.  Experimental investigation of an advanced adsorption refrigeration cycle , 1997 .

[13]  O. K. Bouhelal,et al.  A solar adsorption desalination device: first simulation results , 2004 .

[14]  H. J. Dakkama,et al.  Effect of Evaporator and Condenser Temperatures on the Performance of Adsorption Desalination Cooling Cycle , 2015 .

[15]  Eric Hu,et al.  Thermodynamic analysis of an adsorption-based desalination cycle (part II): Effect of evaporator temperature on performance , 2011 .

[16]  F. Lemmini,et al.  Building and experimentation of a solar powered adsorption refrigerator , 2005 .

[17]  Mark Goldsworthy,et al.  Measurements of water vapour sorption isotherms for RD silica gel, AQSOA-Z01, AQSOA-Z02, AQSOA-Z05 and CECA zeolite 3A , 2014 .

[18]  K. Ng,et al.  Adsorption characteristics of water vapor on ferroaluminophosphate for desalination cycle , 2014 .

[19]  K. Ng,et al.  Experimental investigation of the silica gel–water adsorption isotherm characteristics , 2001 .

[20]  K. Srinivasan,et al.  Performance evaluation of a two-stage silica gel + water adsorption based cooling-cum-desalination system , 2015 .

[21]  Ahmed A. Askalany.  Innovative mechanical vapor compression adsorption desalination (MVC-AD) system , 2016 .

[22]  Li Zhongfu,et al.  Experiments with solar-powered adsorption ice-maker , 1999 .

[23]  Kyaw Thu,et al.  Adsorption desalination: An emerging low-cost thermal desalination method , 2013 .

[24]  Kyaw Thu,et al.  Solar-assisted dual-effect adsorption cycle for the production of cooling effect and potable water , 2009 .

[25]  Kim Choon Ng,et al.  Adsorption Characteristics of Silica Gel + Water Systems , 2002 .

[26]  Raya Al-Dadah,et al.  Performance analysis of four bed adsorption water desalination/refrigeration system, comparison of AQSOA-Z02 to silica-gel , 2015 .

[27]  Kim Choon Ng,et al.  Experimental investigation of an adsorption desalination plant using low-temperature waste heat , 2005 .

[28]  Kyaw Thu,et al.  Water quality assessment of solar-assisted adsorption desalination cycle , 2014 .

[29]  Hideharu Yanagi,et al.  Performance analysis of a low-temperature waste heat-driven adsorption desalination prototype , 2013 .

[30]  Gary L. Amy,et al.  A hybrid multi-effect distillation and adsorption cycle , 2013 .

[31]  A. Chakraborty,et al.  Thermally driven adsorption cooling and desalination employing multi-bed dual-evaporator system , 2016 .

[32]  Kian Jon Chua,et al.  Performance investigation of a waste heat-driven 3-bed 2-evaporator adsorption cycle for cooling and desalination , 2016 .

[33]  K. Harby,et al.  A state of the art of hybrid adsorption desalination–cooling systems , 2016 .

[34]  Kim Choon Ng,et al.  How Heat and Mass Recovery Strategies Impact the Performance of Adsorption Desalination Plant: Theory and Experiments , 2007 .

[35]  Kyaw Thu,et al.  Study on a waste heat-driven adsorption cooling cum desalination cycle , 2012 .

[36]  Catherine Hildbrand,et al.  A new solar powered adsorption refrigerator with high performance , 2004 .