Vapor Absorption

Refrigeration
Cycles
 Simple Vapor Absorption Refrigeration
Cycle
Introduction
 The vapour absorption refrigeration system is one of
the oldest method of producing refrigerating effect.
The principle of vapour absorption was first discovered
by Michael Faraday in 1824 while performing a set of
experiments to liquefy certain gases.
 The vapour absorption system uses heat energy,
instead of mechanical energy as in vapour compression
systems, in order to change the conditions of the
refrigerant required for the operation of the
refrigeration cycle.
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 2
 Cont…
 In the vapour absorption system, the compressor is
replaced by an absorber, a pump, a generator and a
pressure reducing valve.
 These components in vapour absorption system perform
the same function as that of a compressor in vapour
compression system.
 In this system, the vapour refrigerant from the evaporator
is drawn into an absorber where it is absorbed by the
weak solution of the refrigerant forming a strong
solution.
 This strong solution is pumped to the generator where it
is heated by some external source

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 3

 Cont…

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 4

 Cont…
 In this system, the low pressure ammonia vapor leaving the evaporator
enters the absorber where it is absorbed by the cold water in the
absorber
 The water has the ability to absorb very large quantities of ammonia
vapor and the solution, thus formed is known as aqua-ammonia.
 The absorption of ammonia vapor in water lowers the pressure in the
absorber which in turn draws more ammonia vapor from the
evaporator and thus raises the temperature of the solution.
 Some form of cooling arrangement usually water cooling is employed
in the absorber to remove the heat of solution evolved there.
 This is necessary in order to increase the absorption capacity of water,
because at high temperature water absorbs less ammonia vapor. The
strong solution thus formed in the absorber is pumped to the generator
by the liquid pump. (the pump used for increasing the pressure of the
solution up to 10bar).
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 5
 Cont…
 The strong solution of ammonia in the generator is heated by
some external source such as gas or steam.
 During the heating process, the ammonia vapor is driven off
the solution at high pressure leaving behind the hot weak
ammonia solution in the generator.
 This weak ammonia solution flows back to the absorber at
low pressure after passing through the pressure reducing
valve.
 The high pressure ammonia vapor from the generator is
condensed in the condenser to a high liquid ammonia
 This liquid ammonia is passed to the expansion valve through
the receiver and then to the evaporator. And this complete the
simple vapor absorption cycle

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 6

Coefficient of performance of an ideal
vapor absorption refrigeration cycle

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 7

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 8
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 9
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 10
 Cont…

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 11

 Cont…

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 12

 Practical Vapor Absorption system
The simple absorption system discussed in
previous slide is not very economical.
In order to make the system more practical,
it is fitted with an analyzer, a rectifier and
two heat exchanger as shown in the figure
below. And these accessories helps to
improve the performance and working of the
system.

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 13

Cont…
 Cont…

15
Cont…
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 17
 Advantage of vapor absorption refrigeration
system over vapor compression refrigeration
system
1. The operation system is quite and is subjected to little wear
2. The vapor absorption system uses heat energy to change the
condition of refrigerant from the evaporator. In case of vapor
compression, mechanical energy is used
3. Vapor absorption system are usually designed to use steam either at
high or low pressure. The exhaust steam from furnace and solar
energy may also be used. Thus this system can be used where the
electric power is difficult to obtain or very expensive
4. The vapor absorption system can operate at reduced evaporator
pressure and temperature by increasing the steam pressure to the
generator with little decrease in capacity. But the capacity of vapor
compression system drop rapidly with lowered evaporator pressure.
 Cont…
5. The load variations do not affect the performance of a vapor
absorption system. The load variation are met by controlling the
quality of aqua circulated and the quantity of steam supplied to
the generator. The performance of a vapor compression system
at partial load is poor.
6. In vapor absorption system, the liquid refrigerant leaving the
evaporator has no bad effect on the system except that of
reducing refrigerating effect. In vapor compression refrigeration
system, it is essential to superheat the vapor refrigerant leaving
the evaporator so that no liquid may enter the compressor.
7. The vapor absorption system can built in capacities well
above 1000TR each, which is the largest size for single
compressor unit
The space requirement and automatic control requirements
favour the absorption system more and more as the desired
evaporator temperature drops.
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 19
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 vapor compression refrigeration cycles 20
 Air
Refrigeration
System
 Specific Objective of the Lesson
This lesson discusses various gas cycle refrigeration system
based on air, namely:
1. Reversed Carnot cycle and its limitation
2. Reversed Brayton cycle- Ideal & Actual
3. Aircraft refrigeration system, namely: simple system, Bootstrap
system, Regenerative system, …
At the end of the lesson, the student should be able to:
 Describe various air cycle refrigeration systems
 State the assumption made in the analyses of air cycle systems
 Show the cycle on T-S and P-h diagrams
 Perform various cycle calculations.

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 Basic Concepts in Refrigeration 22

 Introduction
 Air cycle refrigeration systems belong to the general class
of gas cycle refrigeration systems, in which a gas is used as
the working fluid.

 The gas does not undergo any phase change during the
cycle, consequently, all the internal heat transfer processes
are sensible heat transfer processes.

 Gas cycle refrigeration systems find applications in air

craft cabin cooling and also in the liquefaction of various
gases. In the present chapter gas cycle refrigeration systems
based on air are discussed
Tuesday, December 19, 2023 Basic Concepts in Refrigeration 23
 Air Standard Cycle analysis

 Air cycle refrigeration system analysis is considerably simplified

if one makes the following assumptions:
I. The working fluid is a fixed mass of air that behaves as an ideal
gas.
II. The cycle is assumed to be a closed loop cycle with all inlet and
exhaust processes of open loop cycles being replaced by heat
transfer processes to or from the environment .
III. All the processes within the cycle are reversible, i.e., the cycle
is internally reversible .
IV. The specific heat of air remains constant throughout the cycle.
24
 An analysis with the above assumptions is called as cold Air
Standard Cycle (ASC) analysis.

 This analysis yields reasonably accurate results for most of

the cycles and processes encountered in air cycle
refrigeration systems.

 However, the analysis fails when one considers a cycle

consisting of a throttling process, as the temperature drop
during throttling is zero for an ideal gas, whereas the actual
cycles depend exclusively on the real gas behavior to
produce refrigeration during throttling.
25
Basic concepts
 The temperature of an ideal gas can be reduced either by:
 making the gas to do work in an isentropic process or,
 sensible heat exchange with a cooler environment.

 When the gas does adiabatic work in a closed system by

say, expanding against a piston, its internal energy drops.
 Since the internal energy of the ideal gas depends only on
its temperature, the temperature of the gas also drops during
the process, i.e.,

26
where
m is the mass of the gas,
u1 and u2 are the initial and final internal energies of the
gas,
 T1 and T2 are the initial and final temperatures and
cv is the specific heat at constant volume.
 If the expansion is reversible and adiabatic, by using the
ideal gas equation PV=RT and the equation for isentropic
process the final temperature is related to the
initial temperature (T1) and initial and final pressures (P1
and P2) by the equation:

27
 Isentropic expansion of the gas can also be carried out in a
steady flow in a turbine which gives a net work output.
 Neglecting potential and kinetic energy changes, the work
output of the turbine is given by:
W= m(h1-h2)=m cp(T1-T2)

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 Reversed Carnot cycle employing a gas

 Reversed Carnot cycle is an ideal refrigeration cycle for

constant temperature external heat source and heat sinks.
 Figure (a) shows the schematic of a reversed Carnot
refrigeration system using a gas as the working fluid along
with the cycle diagram on T-s and P-v coordinates.
 As shown, the cycle consists of the following four
processes:
 Process 1-2: Reversible, adiabatic compression in a compressor.
 Process 2-3: Reversible, isothermal heat rejection in a compressor.
 Process 3-4: Reversible, adiabatic expansion in a turbine.
 Process 4-1: Reversible, isothermal heat absorption in a turbine

29
(a). Schematic of a reverse Carnot refrigeration system
30
(b). Reverse Carnot refrigeration system in P-v
and T-s coordinates
31
 The heat transferred during isothermal processes 2-3 and 4-
1 are given by:

 Applying first law of thermodynamics to the closed cycle,

 the work of isentropic expansion, w3-4 exactly matches the

work of isentropic compression w1-2.
 The COP of the Carnot system is given by:

32
 Thus the COP of the Carnot system depends only on the
refrigeration (Tl ) and heat rejection (Th) temperatures only.
Limitations of Carnot cycle:
 Carnot cycle is an idealization and it suffers from several
practical limitations.
 One of the main difficulties with Carnot cycle employing a
gas is the difficulty of achieving isothermal heat transfer
during processes 2-3 and 4-1.
 For a gas to have heat transfer isothermally, it is essential to
carry out work transfer from or to the system when heat is
transferred to the system (process 4-1) or from the system
(process 2-3). This is difficult to achieve in practice.
 In addition, the volumetric refrigeration capacity of the
Carnot system is very small leading to large compressor
displacement, which gives rise to large frictional effects.
 All actual processes are irreversible, hence completely33
reversible cycles are idealizations only.
 Ideal reverse Brayton cycle

(a) Schematic of a closed reverse Brayton cycle

 This is an important cycle frequently employed in gas cycle
refrigeration systems.
 This may be thought of as a modification of reversed Carnot cycle,
as the two isothermal processes of Carnot cycle are replaced by two
isobaric heat transfer processes. This cycle is also called as Joule or
Bell-Coleman cycle. Figure (a) and (b) shows the schematic of a34
closed, reverse Brayton cycle and also the cycle on T-s
diagram. As shown in the figure, the ideal cycle consists of the
following four processes:
 Process 1-2: Reversible, adiabatic compression in a compressor
 Process 2-3: Reversible, isobaric heat rejection in a heat exchanger
 Process 3-4: Reversible, adiabatic expansion in a turbine
 Process 4-1: Reversible, isobaric heat absorption in a heat exchanger

35
(b) Reverse Brayton cycle in T-s plane
 Process 1-2: Gas at low pressure is compressed isentropically from state
1 to state 2.
Applying steady flow energy equation and neglecting changes in kinetic
and potential energy, we can write:

o Process 2-3: Hot and high pressure gas flows through a heat exchanger
and rejects heat sensibly and isobarically to a heat sink.
The enthalpy and temperature of the gas drop during the process due to
heat exchange, no work transfer takes place and the entropy of the gas
decreases. Again applying steady flow energy equation and second T ds
equation:

36
 Process 3-4: High pressure gas from the heat exchanger
flows through a turbine, undergoes isentropic expansion and
delivers net work output. The temperature of the gas drops
during the process from T3 to T4.
From steady flow energy equation:

37
 Process 4-1: Cold and low pressure gas from turbine flows
through the low temperature heat exchanger and extracts
heat sensibly and isobarically from a heat source, providing
a useful refrigeration effect.
The enthalpy and temperature of the gas rise during the
process due to heat exchange, no work transfer takes place
and the entropy of the gas increases.
Again applying steady flow energy equation and second T
ds equation:

38
 From the above equations, it can be easily shown that:

 Applying 1st law of thermodynamics to the entire cycle:

 The COP of the reverse Brayton cycle is given by:

 using the relation between temperatures and pressures, the

COP can also be written as:

 From the above expression for COP, the following

39
observations can be made:
A. For fixed heat rejection temperature (T3) and fixed
refrigeration temperature (T1), the COP of reverse Brayton
cycle is always lower than the COP of reverse Carnot cycle
, that is

Comparison of reverse Carnot and reverse Brayton cycle in T-

s plane
40
B. COP of Brayton cycle approaches COP of Carnot cycle as
T1 approaches T4 (thin cycle), however, the specific
refrigeration effect [cp(T1-T4)] also reduces
simultaneously.
C. COP of reverse Brayton cycle decreases as the pressure
ratio rp increases
Actual reverse Brayton cycle:
 The actual reverse Brayton cycle differs from the ideal cycle
due to:
I. Non-isentropic compression and expansion processes
II. Pressure drops in cold and hot heat exchangers

41
 Comparison of ideal and actual Brayton cycles T-s plane

 Figure above shows the ideal and actual cycles on T-s

diagram. Due to these irreversibility, the compressor work
input increases and turbine work output reduces. The actual
work transfer rates of compressor and turbine are then given
by:
42
 where ηc,isen and ηt,isen are the isentropic efficiencies of
compressor and turbine, respectively.
 In the absence of pressure drops, these are defined as:

 The actual net work input, wnet,act is given by:

 thus the net work input increases due to increase in

compressor work input and reduction in turbine work output.
 The refrigeration effect also reduces due to the
irreversibilities.
 As a result, the COP of actual reverse Brayton cycles will be
considerably lower than the ideal cycles. Design of efficient
compressors and turbines plays a major role in improving the
43
COP of the system.
 In practice, reverse Brayton cycles can be open or closed.
In open systems, cold air at the exit of the turbine flows into
a room or cabin (cold space), and air to the compressor is
taken from the cold space. In such a case, the low side
pressure will be atmospheric.
 In closed systems, the same gas (air) flows through the
cycle in a closed manner. In such cases it is possible to have
low side pressures greater than atmospheric. These systems
are known as dense air systems.
 Dense air systems are advantageous as it is possible to
reduce the volume of air handled by the compressor and
turbine at high pressures.
Efficiency will also be high due to smaller pressure ratios.
It is also possible to use gases other than air (e.g. helium) in
44
closed systems.
 Aircraft cooling systems
 In an aircraft, cooling systems are required to keep the cabin
temperatures at a comfortable level. Even though the outside
temperatures are very low at high altitudes, still cooling of cabin
is required due to:
I. Large internal heat generation due to occupants, equipment etc.
II. Heat generation due to skin friction caused by the fast moving
aircraft.
III. At high altitudes, the outside pressure will be sub-atmospheric.
When air at this low pressure is compressed and supplied to the
cabin at pressures close to atmospheric, the temperature
increases significantly. For example, when outside air at a
pressure of 0.2 bar and temperature of 223 K (at 10000 m
altitude) is compressed to 1 bar, its temperature increases to
about 353 K. If the cabin is maintained at 0.8 bar, the
temperature will be about 332 K. This effect is called as ram
effect. This effect adds heat to the cabin, which needs to be
taken out by the cooling system.
IV. Solar radiation. 45
 For low speed aircraft flying at low altitudes, cooling system may
not be required, however, for high speed aircraft flying at high
altitudes, a cooling system is a must.
 Even though the COP of air cycle refrigeration is very low
compared to vapour compression refrigeration systems, it is still
found to be most suitable for aircraft refrigeration systems as:
I. Air is cheap, safe, non-toxic and non-flammable. Leakage of
air is not a problem
II. Cold air can directly be used for cooling thus eliminating
the low temperature heat exchanger (open systems) leading
to lower weight
III. The aircraft engine already consists of a high speed turbo-
compressor, hence separate compressor for cooling system is
not required. This reduces the weight per kW cooling
considerably. Typically, less than 50% of an equivalent
vapour compression system
IV. Design of the complete system is much simpler due to low
pressures. Maintenance required is also less. 46
 Advantage of air cycle for air plane
refrigeration
 No cost of refrigerant involved, quit cheap
 Main compressor of gas turbine is used
 Chilled air is directly used for cooling
 Minor leakage is not a problem
 Low pressure in the system
 Less Weight per ton of refrigeration (rpm of compressor is high,
60,000)
 Air is non toxic and non flammable
 Refrigeration system is light in weight

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 Basic Concepts in Refrigeration 47

 Disadvantage of air cycle for air
plane refrigeration
 Low coefficient of performance
 Sensible heating of refrigerant and freezing of
moisture
Types of Airplane refrigeration system
1. Simple
2. Boot strap
3. Regenerative
4. Reduced ambient

Tuesday, December 19, 2023 Basic Concepts in Refrigeration 48

 Figure above shows the schematic of a simple aircraft
refrigeration system and the operating cycle on T-s diagram.
This is an open system.
 As shown in the T-s diagram, the outside low pressure and
low temperature air (state 1) is compressed due to ram effect
to ram pressure (state 2). 49

 During this process its temperature increases from 1 to 2.

 This air is compressed in the main compressor to state 3, and
is cooled to state 4 in the air cooler.
 Its pressure is reduced to cabin pressure in the turbine (state
5), as a result its temperature drops from 4 to 5. The cold air
at state 5 is supplied to the cabin.
 It picks up heat as it flows through the cabin providing
useful cooling effect. The power output of the turbine is used
to drive the fan, which maintains the required air flow over
the air cooler.
 This simple system is good for ground cooling (when the
aircraft is not moving) as fan can continue to maintain
airflow over the air cooler.

50
 By applying steady flow energy equation to the ramming
process, the temperature rise at the end of the ram effect can
be shown to be:

 where M is the Mach number, which is the ratio of velocity

of the aircraft (C) to the sonic velocity a
i.e.,

Due to irreversibilities, the actual pressure at the end of

ramming will be less than the pressure resulting from
isentropic compression.
The ratio of actual pressure rise to the isentropic pressure
rise is called as ram efficiency, ηRam, i.e.,
51
 The refrigeration capacity of the simple aircraft cycle
discussed, is given by:

 where is the mass flow rate of air through the turbine.

52
Bootstrap system:
 Figure below shows the schematic of a bootstrap system,
which is a modification of the simple system.
 As shown in the figure, this system consists of two heat
exchangers (air cooler and after-cooler), in stead of one air
cooler of the simple system.

53
 It also incorporates a secondary compressor, which is driven by the
turbine of the cooling system.
 This system is suitable for high speed aircraft, where in the velocity of
the aircraft provides the necessary airflow for the heat exchangers, as a
result a separate fan is not required.
 As shown in the cycle diagram, ambient air state 1 is pressurized to
state 2 due to the ram effect. This air is further compressed to state 3 in
the main compressor.
 The air is then cooled to state 4 in the air cooler. The heat rejected in
the air cooler is absorbed by the ram air at state 2. The air from the air
cooler is further compressed from state 4 to state 5 in the secondary
compressor.
 It is then cooled to state 6 in the after cooler, expanded to cabin
pressure in the cooling turbine and is supplied to the cabin at a low
temperature T7.
 Since the system does not consist of a separate fan for driving the air
through the heat exchangers, it is not suitable for ground cooling.
However, in general ground cooling is normally done by an external
air conditioning system as it is not efficient to run the aircraft engine
just to provide cooling when it is grounded. 54
Schematic of Bootstrap System

55