Paper presented at the 5th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, South Africa, 1-4 July, 2007.
A thermal wave cycle is one method to achieve thermal
regeneration in an adsorption cooling cycle. A thermodynamic
model is developed to define the performance limits to this
cycle. A zeolite-water adsorbent-refrigerant pair with
maximum bed temperatures ranging from 110 to 200oC is
predicted to have a limiting COP of 1.7 to 3.6. Relative to an
ideal simple adsorption cycle with no thermal regeneration,
these results translate into the potential to reduce the driving
heat transfer by ~ 70%. These reductions in the driving heat
transfer are similar to those for a system with an infinite
number of beds following the simple cycle with maximum
thermal regeneration.
