Experimental Study on the Air-conditioning System using Membrane Dehumidification Module

摘要

Vapor compression systems have technical limitations to reduce power consumption andenvironmental effects due to chemical refrigerants. Therefore, we are paying attention to amembrane air-conditioning system using water as a refrigerant. Since there is no chemicalrefrigerator and compressor, power consumption of the membrane air-conditioning system can begreatly reduced and there is no environmental impact such as global warming.A dehumidifying nanocomposite membrane has been developed. Since this dense membrane hashydrophilic nanochannel, water vapor can be permeated. Therefore, if a difference in water vaporpartial pressure occurs using a vacuum pump, this membrane can remove moisture from the supplyair.We built a permeability testing device of the developed membrane. The test cell was placed in athermo-hygrostat bath. The flow rate, temperature and relative humidity at the inlet and outlet of thetest cell were measured and recorded. The water vapor permeability through the membrane wasmeasured to 50 g/m~2h/kPa.The membrane dehumidification module was designed based on this experimental result andassembled with an IEC (indirect evaporative cooler) module for integrating the air-conditioningsystem. The cooling capacity measured up to 1.2 kW. The feasibility of the membrane airconditioning system has been demonstrated.