Theoretical analysis of an open-cycle absorption heating and cooling system

Abstract In warm countries, such as Italy and Spain, the increasing demand for space conditioning cannot be met by the current capacity of installed electric power. This has led to a growing interest in cooling with natural gas. An interesting thermal cooling system uses open-cycle absorption. It treats the air directly without heat exchangers and with very low temperature drops. With absorption dehumidification it is possible not only to obtain a cooling system similar in performance to conventional thermal cooling systems, but also, with few modifications, a high-performance heating system fed by a natural gas burner, which combines simplicity with PER typical of a gas driven heat pump. The proposed new system described in the paper is studied both in winter and summer mode, evaluating the influence of the different parameters.