Abstract

This article provides an extensive review on design, thermal modelling approaches, and economic, energy and environmental aspects of solar greenhouse dryers developed for drying various agricultural products. Further, the selection and usage of solar photovoltaic panels and thermal energy storage units in the solar greenhouse dryers for achieving continuous and grid-independent drying are discussed in detail. Performances of the various configurations/shapes of the greenhouse dryers in terms of energy requirements are compared. Thermodynamic and thermal modelling studies reported on the performance prediction of solar greenhouse dryers and drying kinetics studies on various agriculture products are summarised. A detailed report on the economic (payback time, cost of the greenhouse dryer, and product drying cost), energy (embodiment energy, specific energy consumption) and environmental (CO2 emission, CO2 mitigation, and carbon credit) aspects of the solar greenhouse dryer based on the dryer type, mode of operation and product dried are presented.

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