Feasibility Of An Air-To-Air Energy Recovery System For Building In Hot-Humid Environment

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Date
2016-09
Authors
Mansur, Fatin Zafirah
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Abstract
Application of an air-to-air energy recovery system as one of the energy efficient technologies that assists with the traditional HVAC system in building application has gained recent attention because of its potential for energy savings. The air-to-air energy recovery system developed in this study employs a fixed plate type of air-to-air energy recovery system made up of hydrophilic polymeric membrane equipped with cross flow configuration designed to assist air-conditioning. The primary goal of this study is to investigate the air-to-air energy recovery system’s performance based on the outdoor design air-condition and real weather data collected with respect to the hot-humid environment. An experimental facility was designed to reproduce the chosen typical hot-humid environment in outdoor and indoor air conditions with respect to temperature and relative humidity. Next, the system was tested under stable operation conditions as frequently used in practice. For the first part, the operating parameters which are airflow rates of (1.0 to 3.0 m/s), intake air temperature of (28°C, 31°C, 35°C and 40°C) and intake relative humidity of (70%, 75%, 80%, 85% and 90%) were varied under certain air conditions to investigate the system’s performance. Meanwhile, the second part examines the system on collected weather data from selected locations, namely Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Kuching, and Kota Kinabalu with fixed airflow rate of 2.0 m/s, which were then introduced into the system. The system’s performance was evaluated in the form of efficiency and recovered energy. The effect of operating parameters based on the outdoor design of air condition denoted that the effect of airflow rate on the system resulted in a decrease in efficiency as the airflow rate increased. The increase of airflow rate causes the increment in recovered energy. The system indicates that as the intake air temperature (Tin) increased, efficiency and recovered energy also increased. Effect of intake relative humidity (RHin) exhibited a decline in efficiency when the intake relative humidity (RHin) increased. Additionally, as the relative humidity increased, the recovered energy of the system remained constant. In terms of air-to-air energy recovery system’s performance based on collected weather data, the highest sensible efficiency (εsen) and latent efficiency (εlat) were achieved with 45% and 42% in Penang at 29.69°C and 84.63%. The highest total recovered energy (qtot) was recorded in Penang at 656 W with a condition of 30°C and 83%. From the data obtained, estimation on potential energy savings of the system were calculated and analysed. It was found that 33% of energy consumption and carbon dioxide emission were reduced by the system in all selected locations. Besides, it has been expected that air-to-air energy recovery has reduced the cost of energy consumption of about 47% for domestic, and 34% for both commercial and industrial. Hence, based on the performance evaluation, the air-to-air energy recovery system is feasible to be utilized in hot-humid climate for building application.
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An air-to-air energy recovery system as one of the energy efficient technologies , in building application is potential for energy savings.
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