Literature review on solar adsorption technologies for ice-making and air-conditioning purposes and recent developments in solar technology

The primary objective of this review is to provide fundamental understandings of the solar adsorption systems and to give useful guidelines regarding designs parameters of adsorbent bed reactors,and the applicability of solar adsorption both in air-conditioning and refrigeration with the improvement of the coefficient of performance. Solar adsorption heat pump and refrigeration devices are of significance to meet the needs for cooling requirements such as air-conditioning and ice-making and medical or food preservation in remote areas. They are also noiseless, non-corrosive and environmentally friendly. For these reasons the research activities in this sector are still increasing to solve the crucial points that make these systems not yet ready to compete with the well-known vapor compression system. There is an increasing interest in the development and use of adsorption chillers due to their various economic and impressive environmental benefits, enabling solar energy or waste heat to be used for applications such as district networks and cogeneration plants. Compared to adsorption systems that require heat sources with temperatures above 100 degreesC (zeolite-water systems, activated carbon-methanol systems) or conventional compressor chillers, a silica gel/water adsorption refrigerator uses waste heat with temperature below 100 degreesC. This creates new possibilities for utilizing low temperature energy. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.