Abstract
As a promising alternative to inefficient vapor-compression-based air conditioning, liquid desiccant dehumidification uses a liquid desiccant in contact with the humid air absorbing the moisture. However, it has not gained much market share due to the issues related to the carryover, corrosion, fouling, and crystallization of liquid desiccant. The research has developed a new membrane-based exchanger, which uses a non-corrosive ionic liquid desiccant and nonporous tubular membranes to address these issues. As the second generation of the prototype, the new exchanger was tested at various operating conditions. According to the experimental data, when it is used in the dehumidification loop, the new membrane-based exchanger achieves a specific vapor transportation rate of 778.6 g/(h–m2) and an average water vapor flux of 0.316 g/(h-m2-Pa), which is a significant improvement compared with the previous designs using nonporous membranes. It also achieved a comparable or even better dehumidification performance compared with the dehumidifiers that use porous membrane and conventional liquid desiccants. However, the regeneration performance is not as good as its dehumidification. It is mainly caused by the high operating temperature required in the regeneration loop. The experimental data and findings provide first-hand experimental data and enhance the understanding of advanced membrane-based ionic liquid desiccant systems.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 111592 |
| Journal | Energy and Buildings |
| Volume | 254 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 1 2022 |
Funding
This work was funded by the Emerging Technologies Program of the Buildings Technology Office at the US Department of Energy; Xergy, a small business technology inventor, is the industrial partner of this project. This work has been authored by the staff of UT-Battelle, LLC, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan). The authors would also like to thank Anthony Gehl and Neal Durfee for their assistance in experimental setup and evaluation. This work was funded by the Emerging Technologies Program of the Buildings Technology Office at the US Department of Energy; Xergy, a small business technology inventor, is the industrial partner of this project. This work has been authored by the staff of UT-Battelle, LLC, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan ( http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan ). The authors would also like to thank Anthony Gehl and Neal Durfee for their assistance in experimental setup and evaluation.
Keywords
- Dehumidifier
- Ionic liquid desiccant
- Nonporous membrane
- Regeneration
- Specific vapor transportation rate