Regenerative adsorption heat pumps: Optimization of the design

The optimization of the design of a zeolite-water adsorption heat pump is presented, using a recently published model. Attention has been focused on the optimization of the energy fluxes between the machine components and the user. A modification of the system is proposed to achieve a constant heat flux from the external heat exchanger. The influence of several parameters, including the global bed heat transfer coefficient, on the performance of the system was analyzed.

It was shown that by optimizing the design of the heat pump system, good improvements in performance can be achieved. A constant power of 18.6 kW released during 70% of the cycle time with a COP of 1.4 can be obtained with a two reactor regenerative system using 152 kg of zeolite in total. On the way to more efficient and economic regenerative systems, future research attention should be focused on improving the heat transfer inside the machine.