Case Studies in Thermal Engineering 12 (2018) 687–695

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Case Studies in Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/csite

The effect of solar radiation on the energy consumption of

T
refrigerated container
⁎
Muhammad Arif Budiyantoa, , Takeshi Shinodab
a
Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Universitas Indonesia, Indonesia
b
Department of Marine System Engineering, Kyushu University, Japan

A R T IC LE I N F O ABS TRA CT

Keywords: Refrigerated containers are a special type of cargo container, equipped with an integral re-
Refrigerated container frigeration unit. External power supply is required to run the refrigeration system to control the
Energy consumption temperatures inside the container during transporting perishable goods. The amount of power
Solar radiation consumption of Refrigerated container will change depending on many external variables. This
Environmental parameters
paper provides an investigation of the effect of solar radiation on the energy consumption of
Temperature penetration
Refrigerated container through experimentation. 40 ft high cube Refrigerated container is em-
ployed as a measurement object. Environmental parameters have been collected, i.e., solar ra-
diation, surface temperature, and air temperature. Data analysis shows that the direct effect of
solar radiation on the container surface causes the temperature penetration of the container wall
and increases the amount of energy consumption. With the maximum solar radiation of about
700 W/m2 causes the surface temperature to reach up to 35 °C, and the maximum power con-
sumption reaches 7.5 kW/h during the noon.

1. Introduction

The global container trades are growing year by year with immense cargo volume. In 2014, the global container trade accounted
for 5.3% annual increase from the total international seaborne trade with a volume of 171 million TEUs [1]. This growth was
predicted to continue to increase with large shares from developing countries that have significant population growth and economic
development [2]. Following the container growth, considerable trade of Refrigerated cargo allows the number of container traffic to
increase [3]. As a consequence, there are tremendous energy consumption and environmental impacts that follow. In general, total
energy consumption by Refrigerated container can be estimated through multiplying the number of container traffic with energy
consumed per container, while the environmental impacts are assessed from the product of the total energy consumption with the
emission factors per container.
Several studies have investigated the energy consumption of refrigerated containers under given conditions for a fixed time. From
the measurement of 20 feet and 40 feet Refrigerated containers, the overall mean rate of energy consumption is around 3.6 kW per
TEU [4]. The other investigator conducted experimentation by using temperatures ranging from −18 to + 13.4 °C, which gave the
energy consumption values between 4.42 kW and 8.63 kW respectively [5]. The other study assumed the mean energy consumption
rate of the Refrigerated container to be 2.7 kW/TEU and indicated potential variations of around 60% due to various factor [6]. The
amount of energy consumed by Refrigerated container will change depending on many external variables. A thermal study of a
container for international transport was investigated considering the environment effect. The ambient temperature, particularly the

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: arif@eng.ui.ac.id (M.A. Budiyanto).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.csite.2018.09.005
Received 11 May 2018; Received in revised form 1 August 2018; Accepted 19 September 2018
Available online 20 September 2018
2214-157X/ © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY-NC-ND/4.0/).
M.A. Budiyanto, T. Shinoda Case Studies in Thermal Engineering 12 (2018) 687–695

solar effect, has a significant influence on the internal temperature [7]. The average sun-to-shade difference for external temperature
reaches more than 7 °C, and walls exposed to the sun radiation show a clear difference in thermal patterns compared to the shade
ones [8]. In the previous study, Shinoda and Budiyanto [7] found that the energy consumption at the reefer storage yard contributes
to half of the total electricity consumption and estimated to be continuously increasing over the year. Energy efficiency measures and
strategies are rarely present in this area. The inadequate literature survey about the energy consumption of refrigerated container
motivates us to provide the baseline of energy consumption of the refrigerated container for further development of energy efficiency
measures. This study aims to investigate the energy consumption of refrigerated container from the viewpoint of solar radiation
effect. The energy consumption of refrigerated container would be measured under three different weather conditions to get the
baseline of the power condition under that condition.

2. Methodology

The objective of the measurement experimentation is to understand the thermal exchange process between the Refrigerated
container and the external environment, particularly to measure and verify the effect of solar radiation in the energy consumption of
Refrigerated container. In this study, the 40 feet high cube Refrigerated container is used as a measurement object. The dimension of
the high cube Refrigerated container is 12.1-meter length, 2.4-meter width, and 2.8-meter height [9]. The structure consisted of
ceiling wall, side walls, floor, and corner metal casting foundation. Inside space of Refrigerated container mainly serves as the cargo
hold; the floor is equipped with T-grating functioning as the air circulator of the refrigeration system, which is attached at the end of
the spaces. The container walls are composed of three layers of different materials that are aluminium, polyurethane, and stainless
steel with a thickness of 0.8 mm, 90 mm, and 0.9 mm respectively. The thermal conductivity of these materials are 204 W/mK,
0.03 W/mK, and 16 W/mK respectively.
The measurement experimentation was conducted at Hakata Island City Container Terminal, Fukuoka, Japan. The layout of the
Refrigerated container storage yard has an azimuth angle of 334.185° from North, and Refrigerated container's placement faces the
west [10]. Therefore, the orientation of the Refrigerated container comply with the following rules - the Refrigerated unit is facing the
west, the door is facing the east, one side wall is facing the south, and one side wall is facing the north. Details of the experimentation
location and orientation are shown in Table 1.
To measure various weather conditions under the solar exposure, the experiment was performed during the summer season from
August through October in 2015. Therefore, several devices and sensors are employed to collect environmental circumstances. The
used devices and sensors are pyranometer, power meter, thermocouple, and weather station. Fig. 1 shows the measurement devices
and the arrangement of the sensor location. Pyranometer is placed on the top building facility of the Refrigerated container storage
yard to measure solar radiation. There are 5 pyranometers on the horizontal and vertical plane in all cardinal direction (Fig. 1.a).
Thermocouples are used to measure surface temperature (Fig. 1.c). All pyranometer are installed inside and outside the container
surfaces with the total are 20 points, the arrangement is shown in Fig. 1.d. 5 sensors are attached at the middle points of the inside
surfaces, i.e. floor, sidewall, ceiling, and the center. On the outside surface, 15 sensors are attached on each surface at the middle
point, including fan and compressor surfaces. Power meter measures the energy and the consumption, which is set on the power plug
station near the measurement object (Fig. 1.b). Weather station is also employed to measure wind speed and direction, and is placed
in the building offices. The measurement data from all the devices are recorded every minute in various weather conditions.

Table 1
Location and orientation of the measurement experimentation.
Place Hakata Island City Container Terminal
Degree of longitude 130.40° (130°24'04.24''E)
Degree of latitude 33.65° (33°39'31.15''N)
Altitude above sea-level 2.5 m
Time zone Universal Time Coordinated (UTC) + 9 h
Orientation of refrigerated container 334.185° from North (Wall Azimuth)
Detail orientation

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Fig. 1. Measurement devices and arrangement of thermocouples (a) Pyranometer in all directions (b) Electric power meter (c) Set of thermocouples
(d) Arrangement of Thermocouples.

Fig. 2. Intensity of solar radiation during the measurement experimentation.

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Fig. 3. Measurement results for the solar radiation (a) The feature of solar radiation in sunny condition (b) The feature of solar radiation in rainy
condition.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Solar radiation

Fig. 2 shows the summary of solar intensity during the experiment. Generally, the weather condition can be categorized as sunny
and rainy condition. The sunny condition represents a clear sky when the solar radiation illuminates the earth's surface with the
maximum intensity. Contrariwise, the rainy condition causes exposure of the earth's surface to the solar radiation with the minimum
intensity. During one measurement experimentation, it's difficult to record the sunny condition of the whole day due to various
climatic factors. In a day, the weather condition changes from time to time due to the factors such as cloud condition, effect of
rainfall, wind, etc. Therefore, for each measurement location, it will have a time period with different measurement ranges. The
feature of solar radiation for the sunny and rainy condition is presented here.
The feature of solar radiation in the sunny condition for the whole day that was captured on 22nd September 2015 is shown in
Fig. 3.a The maximum solar radiation occurs on the south and west surface. Highest solar radiation reaches up 850 W/m2 on the
south surface at 10:00 a.m., while on the west surface, highest occurs at 03:00 p.m. Ceiling surface received maximum solar radiation
of about 700 W/m2 at noon. The peak of solar radiation on the east surface is about 500 W/m2 at around 8:30 a.m. Then, on the north
surface, the lowest received solar radiation is about 100 W/m2. The intensity of solar radiation has a different trend line for each

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Fig. 4. Measurement results for the surface temperatures (a) The feature of surface temperatures in sunny condition (b) The feature of surface
temperatures in rainy condition.

surface. The trend line of solar radiation is influenced by the solar position and the orientation of the surface [11]. The solar position
depends on the altitude and azimuth angle of sun. Thus, the orientation depends on the location and wall azimuth angle [12].
Fig. 3.b shows the feature of solar radiation on the rainy condition that was captured on 27th October 2015. The feature of solar
radiation of each surface is entirely different from the sunny condition. All surfaces received equal solar radiation on the same trend
line. The average solar radiation is below 100 W/m2 during noon. This condition indicates that the solar radiation did not reach the
surface because the sky is overcast with clouds. This condition possibly gives benefit to the performance of Refrigerated container.
Radiation incident on a surface that does not have a direct view of the sun consists of diffused and reflected radiation. Therefore, at
sunny noon, solar radiations incident on the east, west, and north surfaces of a south-facing house are identical since they all consist
of diffused and reflected component.

3.2. Surface temperature

Temperature is the most significant parameter for evaluating the performance of Refrigerated container. The characteristics of
temperature change in the Refrigerated container on the sunny and rainy condition are explained. Fig. 4.a shows the temperature
variations of outside and inside of container walls on the sunny condition. The temperature of all the outside surfaces starts to
increase from 06:30 a.m., except for the bottom surface. The three surfaces that are subjected to significant increased temperature at a

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specific time are the south, ceiling, and west surface. Temperature on these surfaces reaches upto 35 °C at 10:00 a.m., 12:00 p.m.,
03:00 a.m. on the south, ceiling and west surface respectively. The temperature of the east surface slightly increased during
07:00–08:00 a.m. with the maximum temperature of 25 °C. For the other surfaces, i.e. north and bottom surface, the temperature
increases are not significant, particularly on the bottom surface, the temperature tends to remain constant. Furthermore, the tem-
perature inside the container also manages to remain constant in all points of measurements. The highest temperature is 2 °C on the
south walls, and the lowest temperature is 0 °C on the floor, which is consistent with the pre-set condition of the refrigeration
machine.
Focusing on the outside surface of container, the trend of surface temperature variation is consistent with the feature of solar
radiation, received on the walls in the sunny condition. The correlation shows that the maximum temperature occurs at the time of
maximum solar energy received on the wall is significant. Surface temperatures increase because of radiation energy, known as
blackbody energy, impinging on the surface in the form of electromagnetic waves will warm up the surface and become the source of
radiation. Thus, the amount of the energy that is absorbed by the surface is converted into thermal energy and raises its temperature.
Thermal energy, in the form of heat transfer, depends on the physical properties of its material. Concerning the effects of solar
radiation, the essential parameter is the radiation property of the container surface. The solar radiation heats up a surface through
absorption, reflection, or transmission of energy. Outside surface of the container is composed of the aluminium with a white color
coating; aluminium is a low absorption metal, and the white coating has excellent properties to reflect the solar radiation [13,14].
Fig. 3.b shows the inside and outside temperature of the container on rainy condition. The all outside temperature lies on the same
trend lines with an average of 19 °C. All surface temperatures increases during 11:30 a.m.–01:00 p.m. with a maximum temperature
of 29 °C, except the bottom surface. The temperature inside the container also tends to be constant with an average temperature of
0 °C. These results suggest that the temperature changes in the rainy condition are consistent with the feature of solar radiation
received on the walls. On the rainy condition, the intensity of the direct solar radiation, incident on the container surfaces, is weak. As
a consequence, radiation energy is not sufficient to increase the surface temperature. Thus, the effect of air temperature is more
dominant on the surface.

3.3. Power consumption

Fig. 5 shows a comparison of the power consumption in the sunny and rainy condition. In the sunny condition, the initial power
consumption is 7.3 kW, and the maximum power consumption reaches 7.5 kW at noon. The power consumption of Refrigerated
container starts rising from 07:00 a.m., then reaches the maximum consumption at 13:00 a.m. However, the starting time of rising
power consumption slightly shifted from the starting time of increasing temperatures. This circumstance of temperature delay is due
to the effect of heat capacity of the insulation material [15–18].
The power consumption in the rainy condition has a different trend compared with the power consumption in the sunny con-
dition. The average power consumption is around 7.3 kW, and the trend line tends to be constant. The energy consumption slightly
increased during 12:00–13:00 p.m., and the maximum consumption reached a value of 7.4 kW. This trend is in accordance with the
temperature changes that occur on the surface and the environment and air surrounding the container.
The trend and order of surface temperature of each container show that the thermal characteristic depends on the position of
surface with respect to direct solar radiation exposure. Increased solar radiation on the wall will increase the surface temperatures;
the surface temperatures represent the performance of the refrigerator container and will cause an increase in the energy

Fig. 5. Power consumption in sunny and rainy condition.

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Fig. 6. Heat transfer processes through the container wall.

consumption. The measurement result shows that the trend line of the power consumption is similar to the changes of air temperature
at the ceiling and environment air. The result is consistent with the previous result, which shows the effect of staking refrigerated
container on the energy consumption by [19].

3.4. Heat transfer processes through container walls

To understand the process of heat conduction, convection, and radiation occurring in a Refrigerated container, consider a wall,
having one surface exposed to solar radiation and the other surface facing inside the container, the illustration is shown in Fig. 6.
From the total solar radiation incident on the outer surface of the wall, a part of it is reflected back to the environment. The remaining
part is absorbed by the wall and converted into heat energy. A part of the energy is again lost to the environment through convection
and radiation from the wall's outer surface. The remaining part is conducted along the wall where it is partly stored, thereby raising
the wall temperature, while the rest reaches inside the cargo container's interior surface. Heat exchanges like these take place through
opaque elements in all part of container walls such as ceiling wall and side walls.
The heat transfer processes start from radiation heat exchange from the solar energy to the container surface. Radiation is the heat
transfer from a body by virtue of its temperature; it increases as the temperature of the body increases. It does not require any
physical medium for propagation. When two or more bodies at different temperatures exchange heat by radiation, heat will be
emitted, absorbed, and reflected by each body [20,21]. This type of radiation consists of short wavelength radiation for solar energy
and long wavelength for the heat emitted by the exterior surfaces. The heat received by the surface then will be emitted, absorbed,
and reflected by each body due to the thermal properties of its material. Then, qnet the net rate of radiation heat transfer from the sun
surface exposed to the inside of the container is determined from following energy balance:
qnet = Gsolar − qreflection − qemission − qconvection (1)

wherein Gsolar is the total solar energy incident on unit area of a horizontal surface, qreflection is the reflected radiation, qemission is the
emitted radiation, and qeconvection is the thermal convection due to air velocity. The net rate of radiation is very important for further
investigation in calculating the cooling load of the Refrigerated container.

3.5. Heat flow through container walls

The heat flow through the container walls is assumed to be equal with the energy consumption by refrigeration unit to keep a
constant temperature inside. The calculation of the heat flow is determined from the heat transfer across the outside surface into the
inside surface, which can be obtained from the temperature differences between the outside and inside surface of the container walls.
The amount of the heat transfer is obtained from the temperature differences between the outside and inside surface of the container
walls. The outside temperature is taken from the external surface temperature, which is influenced by the solar radiation. Inside
temperature is taken from the interior surface temperature, which is influenced by the air inside the container that was set to zero
degree temperature. The total heat flow of a Refrigerated container is contributed mainly by the wall, which has a large surface area,
i.e. ceiling, south, north, and bottom. The illustration of the total heat flow for a Refrigerated container is shown in Fig. 7. The heat
flow of the container wall is calculated from the following equations [22]:
qwall = K × A × (ΔT ) (2)

qTotal = qCeiling + qSouth + qNorth + qBottom (3)

1
K= 1 n xi 1
αi
+ ∑i = 1 λi
+ αo (4)

Eq. (2) is for calculating the heat flow across the wall of the Refrigerated container, and Eq. (3) is for calculating the total heat
from each wall, i.e. ceiling, south, north and bottom side. A represents the area of the wall surface (m2), and ΔT represents the

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Fig. 7. Estimation of the heat flow for a Refrigerated container.

temperature difference between inside and outside of the container (°C). Thus, K represents the overall heat transfer coefficient of the
container wall, calculated using the Eq. (4). In this equation, λ represents the thermal conductivity of each material, and x represent
the thickness of the insulation materials. Then, α represents the convection heat transfer coefficient for the outside and inside air
layer, the values for this coefficient is 23 W/m. K and 9 W/m. K respectively. The calculation of the overall heat transfer coefficient of
the container wall obtained a result of 0.44 W/m2 K. The heat flow of the Refrigerated container is calculated for the sunny and rainy
conditions.
In this section, the calculation of heat flow uses the surface temperature of the Refrigerated container from the measurement
experiment that was conducted on 25th September 2015 (Sunny) and 27th September 2015 (Rainy) with the duration time from
06:00–18:00. From the calculation, the heat flow is 1248.59 W for sunny condition and 1083.87 W for rainy condition, and estimated
energy difference of the solar radiation effect is 15.20%. These results suggest that the heat flow analysis can be considered as the
estimation method to predict the energy difference as a result of the effect of solar radiation [23,24].

4. Conclusion

Various thermal exchanges occurred between a Refrigerated container and the environmental factors. The essential factors in the
thermal exchange processes are the environmental condition, mainly the heat from the sun that affects the ambient air and surface
temperature. The trend of surface temperature change is consistent with the feature of solar radiation received by the walls. The
correlation shows that the maximum temperature occurs linearly with the maximum solar energy received by the container surfaces.
This condition caused the energy consumption of Refrigerated container also to increase due to the heat penetration of the container
wall. The measurement result found that the maximum power consumption reaches 7.5 kW/h on the sunny condition with the
maximum solar radiation of about 700 W/m2, and the average power consumption on the rainy condition decrease to 7.3 kW/h with
the average solar radiation of about 150 W/m2 during noon. This result gives direction on the further research and usage in practice
that the solar radiation from the sun will affect the energy consumption of refrigerated container.

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to express gratitude to the crews of Hakata Port Terminal Corporation for collaborative research in the
experiment by providing required data during this research, and the suggestions for relating future research. The authors also would
like to thank the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Indonesia. This article's publication is
supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through the Sustainable Higher Education Research
Alliance (SHERA) Program for Universitas Indonesia's Scientific Modeling, Application, Research and Training for City-centered
Innovation and Technology (SMART CITY) Project, Grant #AID-497-A-1600004, Sub Grant #IIE-00000078-UI-1.

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