Contribution to the study of combined adsorption–ejection system using solar energy

Abstract

Solar energy is a renewable and free energy. We can take advantage of such characteristics to produce solar cooling through adsorption especially in an area such as the city of Monastir, Tunisia, where the Sun is abundant. A mathematical model and simulation are carried out to optimize heat and mass transfers performance in a flat solar collector using zeolite/water and activated carbon/methanol pairs during desorption phenomena. A commercial simulation software COMSOL Multiphysics has been developed to provide us with the time–space evolution of temperature and average fluid content. Numerical results have shown that the activated carbon desorbs faster than the zeolite. Besides, in order to get an important solar coefficient of performance, it is necessary to have an important incident solar energy. It has also been found that to improve the solar coefficient of performance, an adsorption–ejection system is statically studied.