Performance analysis of a multi-mode thermochemical sorption refrigeration system for solar-powered cooling

A multi-mode thermochemical sorption refrigeration system is presented for solar-powered cooling. The proposed system consists of three sorption refrigeration thermodynamic cycles that can be alternately operated based on the available solar energy insolation viz: combined double-way cycle, double-effect cycle and two-stage cycle. The working performance of the different sorption refrigeration cycles were theoretically analyzed and compared. For combined double-way sorption cycle, both adsorption refrigeration and resorption refrigeration were combined to improve the cooling capacity. For double-effect sorption cycle, one internal heat recovery process was employed to enhance the energy utilization efficiency. For two-stage cycle with internal heat recovery process, a secondary reactive salt was used to lower the driving regeneration temperature. Thermodynamic analysis showed that the working modes of the proposed system can be switched according to the different driving heat source temperatures. In comparison with the conventional solar solid-gas sorption refrigeration system, the presented multi-mode system can contribute to improving the utilization efficiency of solar energy and widening the scope of application of solar thermochemical sorption refrigerator.