ANALYSIS AND SIMULATION OF AN OPEN CYCLE ABSORPTION REFRIGERATION SYSTEM

An open cycle absorption refrigeration system is simulated and analyzed. The open cycle differs from the closed cycle in that the open cycle regenerates the weak absorbent solution by evaporating refrigerant to the earth's atmosphere rather than to a condenser. The solar collector used for the open cycle is one in which the weak absorbent solution flows as a fluid film over a flat, open, black surface. The absorbent solution is heated by the black surface and is regenerated by water evaporating to the atmosphere. It was found that the relationship between the collector length and the solution mass flow rate was tied to environmental factors such as wind and humidity when optimizing system performance. The system performance was simulated for five cities using actual weather data. The overall daily cooling COP's (cooling/incident solar) ranged from 0.09 to 0.45 for various conditions. © 1979.