Desarrollo de un sistema de refrigeración por absorción a partir de energía solar térmica para la universidad Santo Tomás

Abstract

Most domestic refrigeration systems currently work with electricity through a vapor compression cycle of a refrigerant gas, due to this in the non-interconnected zones (ZNI) to the electric grid, where around 1.5 million of people lives, often give up having a fridge, these machines also represent the largest consumption in the Colombian energy matrix with around 30%. In order to provide an alternative for these people, a first prototype of a 30L refrigeration system that works from a thermodynamic absorption-diffusion cycle (DAR) was developed from a benchmarking study, patents and scientific articles. It requires a 22W heat source to operate which is supplied from a composite solar parabolic trough (CPC). The built-in refrigerator operates between 8-14 °C, with a COP of 0.02, and additionally a heat source that reaches 200 °C. The presented prototype makes to reconsider the importance of the DAR systems when raising that their COPs are low the systems are interesting since they work at a zero-energy cost, because the solar energy is free and is available everywhere.

Keywords: domestic refrigeration, non-interconnected zones, absorption-diffusion, solar concentrator.