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Experimental tests of a small‐scale microturbine with a liquid desiccant cooling system
Author(s) -
Badami M.,
Ferrero M.,
Portoraro A.
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
international journal of energy research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.808
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1099-114X
pISSN - 0363-907X
DOI - 10.1002/er.2914
Subject(s) - prime mover , cogeneration , process engineering , engineering , air conditioning , european union , liquid desiccant , desiccant , waste management , environmental science , automotive engineering , power (physics) , mechanical engineering , electricity generation , thermodynamics , chemistry , physics , organic chemistry , business , economic policy
SUMMARY In a trigeneration plant, the thermal energy recovered from the prime mover is exploited to produce a cooling effect. Although this possibility allows the working hours of the plant to be extended over the heating period, providing summer air conditioning through thermally activated technologies, it is rather difficult to find in the literature experimental data on trigeneration plants operation, and the availability of performance characteristics at off‐design conditions is anyway limited. The paper has the aim of showing the experimental data of a real trigeneration system installed at the Politecnico di Torino (Turin, Italy), composed of a natural gas 100 kW el microturbine coupled to a liquid desiccant system. The data are presented for both cogeneration and trigeneration configurations, and for full and partial load operations. An energetic and economic performance assessment at rated power operation is presented, and compared with the partial load operation strategy. The primary energy savings are calculated through a widely accepted methodology, proposed by the European Union, and through another methodology, reported in literature, which seems to the Authors more suitable to describe the energetic performances of trigeneration plants. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.