Cooling in industrial
production and refrigeration of perishable and non-perishable products is common practice throughout the world. Research
studies have been conducted both experimentally and numerically to simulate
Vapor Compression Refrigeration System (VCRS) and its performance respectively,
however, experimental procedure often seems to be expensive and time-consuming
to carry out due to the function of many variables. This study was therefore
designed to numerically simulate the performance assessment of a nanoparticle
enhanced VCRS. A numerical model of a vapor compression refrigeration system
was developed using standard refrigeration equations on each of the major
components of the refrigeration system such as compressor, evaporator,
condenser and expansion valve. The model was then simulated on a MATLAB
platform with a CoolProp installed packages via Python under two different
simulation cases. In the first case, the mass fractions were varied for CuO,TiO2 and Al2O3 nanoparticles while their
densities remained constant and a reversed condition was investigated for the
second case. The results showed that both the refrigerating effect and the
Coefficient Of Performance (COP) of the system increase as both the mass
fraction and density of all the nanoparticles increases. It also shows that the
compressor work decreases as both the mass fraction and density of all the nanoparticles
were increased. On comparing the computational and numerical analysis results,
the study established no significant difference in terms of COP and the use of nanoparticles
were found to have improved the COP of the system.
References
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