Library Subscription: Guest

ISSN Online: 2377-424X

ISBN Print: 978-1-56700-474-8

ISBN Online: 978-1-56700-473-1

International Heat Transfer Conference 16
August, 10-15, 2018, Beijing, China

STUDY ON BIOINSPIRED MOISTURE PERMEABLE PANEL BASED ON SOLID DESICCANT APPLIED FOR DEHUMIDIFICATION

Get access (open in a dialog) DOI: 10.1615/IHTC16.mtr.023403
pages 5819-5826

Abstract

Indoor air temperature and relative humidity control plays an important role in the health and comfort of the occupants. Usually more than 40% of the total energy is consumed on latent heat load. Independent temperature and humidity control is widely acknowledged as a promising way of obtaining higher energy efficiency and advanced technologies have been developed to achieve high effectiveness and energy-saving. However, traditional technologies always suffer from energy consuming issues. In our study, we develop a moisture permeable panel which allows the moisture in the indoor air to go through the panel and evaporated to the outside space, thus realizing the independent humidity control. Such panel has a very simple structure and can directly utilize the solar power. A piece of porous and thermal insulated foam which is used as the matrix is immersed into the silica-sol and dried, and the dried silica-gel is then attached on the skeletons of the matrix. A photo thermal film which is usually consisted of nano-sized carbon black powder is coated on the outside surface of the panel. With this simple structure, the indoor moisture is absorbed by the panel from inside surface and transferred through the desiccant matrix to the outside surface. By applying sufficient heat provided by the photo thermal film, water is desorbed and evaporated to the outside space. This process can continuously pump the indoor moisture to the outside, which is similar to the perspiration of human skin. A small-size experimental setup is designed to evaluate the performance of such panel and obvious dehumidification result is observed under one sun's illumination. Besides the experimental study, the adsorption performance as well as the permeability test result are presented for further understanding. Although this moisture permeable panel still suffer from low dehumidification rate, its relatively simple fabrication process and solar power utilization feature make it a promising technology in future indoor air humidity control.