MEE 431

Refrigeration and Building Mechanical System

Course Teacher:
Nafiza Anjum, Lecturer, MEE, SUST

1
 Introduction

Lecture 01 Refrigeration Cycle

Vapor Compression Ref System

Contents (VCRS)
Ideal Cycles and Deviations

2
 Introduction
Lecture 01
(21/1/2020)

3
Refrigeration

Refrigeration is a process of reducing and maintaining low temperature of a space

or material below the temperature of the surroundings.

“Refrigeration is the process of removing heat from an enclosed space, or from a

substance, and rejecting it elsewhere for the purpose of lowering the temperature
of the enclosed space or substance and then maintaining that lower temperature.”

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Application

• Dairy products are constantly in need of refrigeration

• To liquefy gases like oxygen, nitrogen, propane and methane.
• In oil refineries, chemical plants and petrochemical plants, refrigeration is
used to maintain certain processes at their required low temperatures.
• Metal workers use refrigeration to temper steel and cutlery
• Low temperature liquid storage/transportation
• De-waxing of oil
• Separation and condensation of gases
• Solidification and separation of solid
• Low temperature testing
• Removal of heat of reaction

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Application

2. Commercial
1. Domestic refrigeration 3. Industrial refrigeration
refrigeration

4. Marine &
5. Comfort air- 6. Industrial air-
transportation
conditioning conditioning
refrigeration

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Application
1. Domestic Refrigeration

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Application
2. Commercial Refrigeration

Meats, poultry and fish all must

be kept in climate-controlled
environments before being
sold.

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Application
3. Industrial Refrigeration Potato Cold Storage
Temp: 2-4 Deg C
RH: 90%

Cold Storage: for Fruits,

Vegetable, Meat, Fish etc.

Photo courtesy: Dept of ME, BUET 9

Application
3. Industrial Refrigeration

Fish Cold Storage

Temp: -10 to -40 Deg C

Photo courtesy: Dept of ME, BUET 10

Application
4. Marine and Transportation Refrigeration

In transportation,
temperature sensitive
foodstuffs and other
materials by trucks,
trains, airplanes and
sea going vessels.

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Application
4. Comfort Air Conditioning

Comfort air-conditioning is for human comfort.

It involves control of space temperature, humidity, ventilation, air motion and

cleaning/filtering of air.

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Application
4. Comfort Air Conditioning

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Application
4. Comfort Air Conditioning

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Application
5. Industrial Air Conditioning

Air conditioning and dust removal of the machines is extremely important in many
industries.
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Application
5. Industrial Air Conditioning

Functions of industrial air-conditioning include:

• control of moisture of hygroscopic materials.
• govern the chemical/bio-chemical reaction rates.
• limit the variation of size of precision manufacturing items because of thermal
expansion and contraction.
• provide clean, filtered air for production of quality products.
• ensure space temperature/humidity/air-motion for production requirement.

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Freezing

• Temperature of the product is

generally below -18 C
• Allows preservation of taste,
texture and food values.
• Limit enzyme activity.
• Formation of Ice Crystals draws
available water from food, hence,
retards growth of microorganisms.

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Freezing

Frozen vs Fresh fruits/Vegetables?

What are the effects of freezing?

• Nutrition
• Moist

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Freezing Method

Slow Freezing:
accomplished by placing the product in a low temperature room and
allowing it to freeze slowly, usually in still air.

Formed Ice crystals are large, and damage food cells thus causing loss of
flavor, texture and color.

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Freezing Method

Quick Freezing: Quick Freezing Methods:

• Smaller ice crystals are formed & • Air Blast Freezing
less damage to the cells. • Immersion Freezing
• Freezing period is small, less time • Indirect Contact Freezing
is allowed for diffusion of salts &
separation of water.
• Temperature is quickly reduced,
hence bacteria/yeast growth rates
are retarded, thus preventing
decomposition during freezing.

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Freezing Method
1. Air Blast Method

Batch freezer Continuous freezer 21

Freezing Method
2. Immersion Method

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Freezing Method
2. Immersion Method

Liquid immersion freezing is accomplished when a food product, either packaged or

unpackaged, is frozen by immersion in or by spraying with a Refrigerant that remains
liquid throughout the process.

Aqueous solutions of the following substances have been used as Refrigerant :

Liquid Nitrogen, Propylene glycol, Glycerol, Sodium chloride, and mixtures of
salt and sugar.

This technique, although not common, is used commercially for canned citrus juice
concentrate (cans of juice are passed continuously through a chamber containing liquid
freezant); for poultry especially during the initial stages of freezing ( to impart a
uniform, white color to the surface); and an occasionally for fish and shrimp.
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Freezing Method

Ask Yourself:
Comparative advantages and
Disadvantages of Air Blast and
Immersion freezing

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Freezing Method
3. Indirect Contact Method

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Lecture 01
Refrigeration Cycle:
(21/1/2020)
Air standard cycle

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Refrigeration Basic
Phase Change Equilibrium

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Refrigeration Basic
Phase Change Equilibrium

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Refrigeration Basic
The Complete Cycle

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Lecture 01
Vapor Compression Ref System
(21/1/2020) (VCRS)

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Vapor- Compression System
Working Principle

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Vapor- Compression System
Working Principle

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Vapor- Compression System
Components

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Vapor- Compression System
Components: Evaporator

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Vapor- Compression System
Components: Compressor

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Vapor- Compression System
Components: Condenser

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Vapor- Compression System
Components: Expansion Valve

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Lecture 01
(21/1/2020)

Ideal Cycles and Deviations

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Refrigeration Cycle
Reverse Carnot Cycle

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Refrigeration Cycle

Expansion Process:
Carnot cycle demands that the expansion take place isentropically
and that the resulting work be used to help drive the compressor.
Practical difficulties, however, militate against the expansion
engine:
• Isentropic expander is costly and more complex.
• the possible work that can be derived from the engine is
small fraction that must be supplied to the compressor.
• the economics of the power recovery have in past not
justified the cost of the expansion engine.

A throttling device, such as a valve or other restriction, is almost

universally used for this purpose, which is isenthalpic and less
complex. 40
Refrigeration Cycle

Wet Compression vs Dry Compression:

• During compression, droplets present in liquid are
vaporized by the internal heat transfer process
which requires finite time. High-speed compressors
are susceptible to damage by liquid because of the
short time available.
• In wet compression, the droplets of the liquids may
wash the lubricating oil from the walls of the
cylinder, accelerating wear. Dry compression takes
place with no droplets and is preferable.
• Liquid refrigerants may be trapped in the head of
reciprocating compressor by the rising piston,
possibly damaging the valves or the cylinder head.
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Ideal Refrigeration Cycle

Isenthalpic.
NOT Isentropic

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Ideal Refrigeration Cycle

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Deviation from Ideal Refrigeration Cycle

• Refrigerant pressure drop in piping, evaporator, condenser, receiver

tank, and through the valves and passages.
• Sub-cooling of liquid leaving the condenser.
• Super-heating of vapor leaving the evaporator.
• Compression process is not isentropic

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Super-Heating and Sub-Cooling

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Super-Heating and Sub-Cooling

• Sub-cooling of liquid serves a desirable function of ensuring that 100% liquid

will enter the expansion device.
• Super-heating of vapor ensures no droplets of liquid being carried over into
the compressor.
• Even though refrigeration effect is increased, compression work is greater &
probably has negligible thermodynamic advantages.

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 Performance Parameters
Lecture 02 Multipressure System

CONTENTS Flash Gas Removal

Inter-cooling

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Lecture 02 Performance parameters

(22/01/2020)

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Unit of Refrigeration

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Co-efficient of Performance

Reverse
Carnot

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Co-efficient of Performance

Ideal
Cycle

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Performance Parameters

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Performance Parameters
Is COP always greater than UNITY?

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance

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Co-efficient of Performance
A single stage vapor compression refrigeration system has one low side pressure (evaporator
pressure) and one high side pressure (condenser pressure). The performance of single stage
systems shows that these systems are adequate as long as the temperature difference between
evaporator and condenser (temperature lift) is small. However, there are many applications
where the temperature lift can be quite high.

The temperature lift can become large either due to the requirement of very low evaporator
temperatures and/or due to the requirement of very high condensing temperatures. For
example, in frozen food industries the required evaporator can be as low as –40 oC, while in
chemical industries temperatures as low as –150 oC may be required for liquefaction of gases.

On the high temperature side the required condensing temperatures can be very high if the
refrigeration system is used as a heat pump for heating applications such as process heating,
drying etc. However, as the temperature lift increases the single stage systems become
inefficient and impractical.
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Co-efficient of Performance
Effect of Evaporation temperature

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Co-efficient of Performance
Effect of Evaporation temperature

It can be seen from the T s diagrams that for a given condenser temperature, as evaporator temperature
decreases:
1. Throttling losses increase
2. Superheat losses increase
3. Compressor discharge temperature increases
4. Quality of the vapor at the inlet to the evaporator increases
5. Specific volume at the inlet to the compressor increases

As a result of this, the refrigeration effect decreases and work of compression increases as shown in the P h
diagram. The volumic refrigeration effect also decreases rapidly as the specific volume increases with
decreasing evaporator temperature.

Similar effects will occur, though not in the same proportion when the condenser temperature increases for
a given evaporator temperature.

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Co-efficient of Performance
Effect of Evaporation temperature

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Co-efficient of Performance
Effect of Condenser temperature

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Co-efficient of Performance
Effect of Evaporation and Condenser temperature

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So,

Due to these drawbacks, single stage systems are not recommended

when the evaporator temperature becomes very low and/or when the
condenser temperature becomes high. In such cases multi-stage
systems are used in practice.

Generally, for fluorocarbon and ammonia based refrigeration systems a

single stage system is used upto an evaporator temperature of –30o C.
A two-stage system is used upto –60o C and a three-stage system is
used for temperatures below –60o C.

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Lecture 02 Multipressure System

(26/01/2020) Flash Gas Removal

Inter-cooling

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Multi-pressure VC System

• A multi-pressure system is a refrigeration system that has two or more low-

pressure side.

• A multi-pressure system may be found in a dairy where one evaporator operates at

-35̊ C to harden ice cream while another evaporator operates at 2̊ C to cool milk.

• In process industries a two or three stage compression arrangement serves an

evaporator operating at a low temperature of -20̊ C or lower.

• Two functions often integral to multi-pressure systems are:

• Removal of flash gas
• Inter-cooling
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Flash Gas Removal

When saturated liquid expands through an expansion device, fraction of vapor or

flash gas progressively increases. Power is saved if developed flash gas is removed
& re-compressed before complete expansion.

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Inter-Cooling

Inter-cooling between two stages of

compression reduces the compression
work.

Inter-cooling can be done by:

(a) with a water cooled condenser
(b) by using refrigerant:
- flash inter-cooler

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Inter-Cooling
Inter-cooling Methods

Inter-cooling by water Flash Intercooler

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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Inter-Cooling
Example

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