Design and Development of a Desiccant Integrated Solar Dryer

摘要

Desiccant integrated solar dryer was designed, developed and its performance was studied under the climatic conditions of Hisar, India. The system consisted of flat plate solar collector, drying chamber and desiccant unit. The desiccant unit was integrated within the drying system to continue the drying process during off sunshine hours at night. During Sunshine hours, the average drying air temperature and collector thermal efficiency of dryer were 48.1 ℃ and 62.12 % at air mass flow rate of 0.020 kg/s. During off-sunshine hours, the average dryer temperature was 6.2 ℃ higher than the average ambient temperature and average RH of dryer was lower by 12.9 % than average ambient RH showing the potential of desiccant integrated solar dryer for drying of food material even during night time operations.