The use of hot air from room type coolers for drying agricultural products.

摘要

Room type coolers are extensively used for cooling or freezing foods such as fruits, vegetables, medicinal plants, milk, yoghurt, eggs, meats, poultry, fish, and ice cream in developed and developing countries. This type of equipment continuously transfers heat energy from the cooling room to outside in order to keep a low temperature inside. This means that the heat, which depends on the specifications of cold rooms and environment conditions, is given to the atmosphere. On the other hand, several agricultural products are dried with hot air to increase their storage period in these countries. However, the production of hot air is expensive. Particularly, in areas that have high humidity and low solar radiation, the cost of hot air is more expensive, and the use of waste hot air during harvesting period in these regions is very important for saving energy. Therefore, the possibility of using waste heat energy from cold rooms for drying agricultural products was investigated. Four different types of room coolers (T-1, T-2, T-3 and T-4), a harvesting period from May to October, and the Black Sea Region of Turkey that has high humidity and low solar radiation were specifically selected for this study. The results of the study shows that the hot air produced by room type coolers is suitable for drying agricultural products. During the harvesting period, 2390 kWh waste heat energy can be used for drying and 3249 kg moisture can be removed from the product..