A novel air curtain: Multi-parallel ejector air curtain for blood plasma cold storage

Abstract

The installation of air curtains above the cold storage doors can reduce energy consumption. However, with the advancement of the refrigeration industry, the functions of cold storage have become more diversified and intelligent, rendering conventional fan-driven air curtains inadequate to meet market demands. Previous studies on air curtains primarily focused on their operational parameters and structures, neglecting the compatibility and applicability of air curtains with the functions of cold storage, thus lacking comprehensive experimental evaluation methods for their suitability. This study proposes a novel multi-parallel ejector air curtain suitable for automated plasma cold storage equipped with automatic doors. The performance of the air curtain is obtained through a comparison with conventional fan-driven air curtains in terms of sealing efficiency, temperature change and humidity change. Experimental results demonstrate that when the discharge velocity is 14 m/s, the multi-parallel ejector air curtain achieves a sealing efficiency of 39.6 %, resulting in a decrease of 0.92 ℃ in the average temperature rise within the cold storage and a reduction of 5.98 % in relative humidity increase. The sealing efficiency of conventional air curtains is 11.38 %, leading to a decrease of 0.82 °C in the average temperature rise within the cold storage and a reduction of 3.08 % in relative humidity increase. Analysis indicates that for automated plasma cold storage, the multi-parallel ejector air curtain is more applicable than conventional air curtains. At discharge velocity of 21 m/s and 26 m/s, the sealing efficiencies of the multi-parallel ejector air curtain are 54.47 % and 56.43 %, respectively, suggesting that moderately increasing the discharge velocity of air curtains contributes to enhancing their performance.