Investigation on indirect evaporative cooling system integrated with liquid dehumidification

Abstract

In hot and humid climates, the latent heat released by the primary air condensation can improve the heat transfer rate of the indirect evaporative cooling (IEC) system. However, it is harsh and unstable to obtain the latent heat only by reaching air dew point temperature. Moreover, the existing IEC and liquid dehumidification systems have a complex structure and large volume. Therefore, this paper developed and improved a novel device integrating the IEC technology and liquid dehumidification technology. The performance of the experimental system was researched under various conditions, including the dehumidification rate, primary air temperature change, wet bulb efficiency, and heat flux. The results showed that the dehumidification rate and the heat flux of the novel system under the different conditions were in the range of 0.92 g/s–1.58 g/s and 1.53 kJ/(m2·s)–2.42 kJ/(m2·s), which are 2.9 and 1.3 times higher than that of the IEC, respectively.