international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

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Study on adsorption of methanol onto carbon based

adsorbents
I.I. El-Sharkawya,b,*, M. Hassana, B.B. Sahac, S. Koyamaa, M.M. Nasrd
a

Interdisciplinary Graduate School of Engineering Sciences, Kyushu University, Kasuga-koen 6-1, Kasuga-shi, Fukuoka 816-8580, Japan
Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Mansoura University, El-Mansoura, Egypt
c
Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent, Singapore 119260
d
Department of Mechanical Power Engineering & Energy, Faculty of Engineering, El-Minia University, El-Minia, Egypt
b

article info

abstract

Article history:

This paper presents the isothermal characteristics of methanol onto two specimens of

Received 30 March 2009

activated carbons namely Maxsorb III and Tsurumi activated charcoal. Dubinin Raduskevich

Received in revised form

(D-R) equation is used to correlate the adsorption isotherms and to form the pressure

26 June 2009

temperatureconcentration diagram for both of the assorted pairs. Experimental results

Accepted 28 June 2009

show that the maximum adsorption capacity of Maxsorb III/methanol pair is 1.76 times that

Published online 3 July 2009

of activated charcoal/methanol pair. Employing a time-independent mathematical model,

the performance of adsorption cooling cycle using Maxsorb III/methanol and activated

Keywords:

charcoal/methanol pairs has been studied and compared with that of three other types of

Adsorption system

carbon based adsorbent/methanol pairs. Theoretical calculations show the superiority of

Methanol

Maxsorb III/methanol pair for both of air-conditioning and ice-making applications.

Activated carbon

2009 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.

Experiment
Comparison
Adsorbent

Etude sur ladsorption du methanol sur des adsorbants

a` base de charbon actif
Mots cles : Syste`me a` adsorption ; Methanol ; Charbon actif ; Experimentation ; Comparaison ; Adsorbant

1.

Introduction

Thermally powered adsorption cooling systems using natural

or alternative to CFCs, HCFCs and HFCs refrigerants have

attracted world-wide attention due to increasing awareness of

global warming and Ozone depletion problems. The main
features of these systems are; (i) the ability to operate by low
temperature heat source typically below 100  C that would be

* Corresponding author. Interdisciplinary Graduate School of Engineering Sciences, Kyushu University, Kasuga-koen 6-1, Kasuga-shi,
Fukuoka 816-8580, Japan.
E-mail addresses: ielsharkawy@mans.edu.eg (I.I. El-Sharkawy), mpebbs@nus.edu.sg (B.B. Saha).
0140-7007/$ see front matter 2009 Elsevier Ltd and IIR. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijrefrig.2009.06.011

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

abundantly available from waste heat or solar energy (Saha

et al., 2003), (ii) almost no electricity usage, and (iii) the
simplicity in construction and operation. However, the main
drawback of solidvapor adsorption cooling/heat pump
systems is their poor performance in terms of cooling capacity
and COP. Adsorption characteristic of the adsorbent/refrigerant pair is one of the most essential parameters that affect
the system performance. It is thus indispensable to realize and
understand the adsorption features of the employed pairs in
terms of adsorption isotherms, adsorption kinetics and heat of
adsorption. Extensive research efforts have been conducted to
investigate the adsorption characteristics of different adsorbent/refrigerant pairs for adsorption cooling/heat pump
applications. Sward et al. (2000) studied a solidvapor system
using zeolite/water pair. Studies of the water adsorption on
zeolites and modified mesoporous materials have been conducted by Janchen et al. (2004) for seasonal storage of solar
heat. The complex compound/salts adsorption cycle for vehicles and residential air-conditioning has been studied by Beijer
and Horsman (1994). The silica-gel/water system powered by
waste heat of temperature below 100  C was investigated
analytically by Saha et al. (1995) and experimentally by Boelman et al. (1995) for air-conditioning purposes. Furthermore, it
is possible to operate these systems with heat sources
temperatures as low as 50  C if multi-stage scheme is
performed (Saha et al., 1997, 2006). The heat and mass
recovery cycles were presented by Wang (2001) to improve
the system performance. Adsorption of water and ethanol
onto 13 molecular sieve, silica-gel and activated carbon has
been discussed by Cui et al. (2005) for cooling applications.
Other promising adsorbents for adsorption cooling applications are activated carbons as they have high adsorption
capacity, high surface area and large pore volume. Moreover,
adsorption/desorption processes of activated carbon (AC) are
completely reversible, which makes AC for unlimited number
of times usage in principle. The performance of adsorption
cooling/heat pump cycles employing AC with different
refrigerants was investigated by Critoph (1989). A novel activated carbon/ammonia based adsorption cycle at which
adsorbent heat transfer can be enhanced by forced convection was also proposed and investigated by Critoph (1994).
Wang et al. (1997) studied the adsorption characteristics of
AC/methanol and activated carbon fiber (ACF)/methanol

pairs. Jing and Exell (1993) measured adsorption equilibrium

of methanol onto several types of activated charcoals. Bentayeb et al. (1995) presented a mathematical model to simulate the operation of solar refrigerator employing activated
carbonmethanol pair taking into account the climatic
conditions in terms of ambient temperature and insolation.
The authors reported that, the behavior of the refrigerator is
significantly affected by the climate conditions. The performance of adsorption refrigerator powered by a compound
parabolic concentrating solar collector using activated charcoal and methanol as absorbent/refrigerant pair has been
investigated by Headley et al. (1994). They reported that, the
proposed system has the ability to produce ice even on
overcast days. A hybrid water heating and refrigeration
system has been investigated experimentally by Wang et al.
(2002). The system consists of a heater, a water bath, an
activated carbon/methanol adsorption bed and an ice box.
Results show that the hybrid solar water heating and icemake are reasonable for practical applications. El-Sharkawy
et al. (2006a,b, 2008) investigated experimentally the
isothermal characteristics of ethanol onto various types of
carbon based adsorbents for adsorption cooling applications.
Recently, AC/methanol pair has been used by Clausse et al.
(2008) for solar adsorption air-conditioning by means of an
enhanced compound parabolic solar collector. The authors
have obtained a mean solar cooling COP of 0.23 from 9 a.m. to
9 p.m. for the indoor thermal comfort, which is maintained at
temperature between 24 and 25  C. Thus the exploration of
functional carbonaceous adsorbent materials such as pitch
based activated carbon of type Maxsorb III and activated
charcoal for methanol adsorption seems promising for
adsorption cooling and refrigeration applications.
The present study is therefore dealing with the experimental investigation of adsorption isotherms of Maxsorb
III/methanol and Tsurumi activated charcoal/methanol pairs
for a possible use in adsorption cooling system application.
The measured adsorption isotherms data are correlated from
which the pressuretemperatureconcentration (PTW)
diagrams are plotted and used to investigate the performance
of adsorption cooling cycle. The performance of adsorption
cooling and ice making cycles using the assorted two pairs
have been compared with that of three other types of carbon
based adsorbent/methanol pairs.

Fig. 1 Schematic layout of the experimental set-up.

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

10
5

15

60

90

10

110

5
120
Fig. 2 Cross sectional view of the adsorber.

2.1.

Set-up

Fig. 1 shows the schematic layout of the experimental apparatus which composes an evaporator, an adsorber, stainless
steel connecting tubes with 3/8 in inner diameter and a set of
Swagelok fittings. The evaporator consists of a stainless steel
tube of 20 mm inner diameter connected with a glass tube of
4.8 mm inner diameter. Implementing the glass tube in
the evaporator makes it possible to detect the height of the
refrigerant prior and after each adsorption experiment. The
adsorber chamber is made from stainless steel with 120 mm
outer diameter and 90 mm height supported with circular fins
at its inner base. Fig. 2 shows the cross sectional view of the
adsorber. As can be seen from Fig. 2, the fin pitches are grooved
through the adsorber base to reduce the thermal resistance
between fins and the adsorber base. A fine mesh packed in
a stainless steel frame surrounded with a rubber o-ring is used
to stop the migration of the adsorbent particles during the
evacuation process. Moreover, a valve with a 2 mm mesh is also
fixed above the adsorber flange to stop the adsorbent particles
that could escape in-between the rubber o-ring and the
adsorber wall surface. The main advantages of the employed
adsorber are; (i) it is able to hold adsorbent particles having the
diameter in the order of few micrometers during the evacuation process, (ii) the circular fins in the adsorber enhance the
heat transfer rate between adsorbent bed and the heat transfer
fluid and thus significantly reduces the time required to reach
the equilibrium condition, and (iii) it provides a uniform
temperature distribution thorough the adsorbent bed.
The materials used in the present study are highly porous
activated carbon powder namely Maxsorb III supplied by Kansai
Coke and Chemicals Company Ltd., Japan with a stated surface

0.5
0
-0.5
-1

Ln(W)

Experimental section

-1.5
-2
-2.5
r2 = 0.9994

-3
-3.5

a
0

8 105

8 105

(Tln(PS/P))2
0
-0.5
-1

Ln(W)

2.

-1.5
-2
r2 = 0.9994

-2.5
-3

b
0

(Tln(PS

/P))2

Fig. 3 (a) - Linear fitting of the D-R equation for Maxsorb

III/methanol pair. (b) - Linear fitting of the D-R equation for
activated charcoal/methanol pair.

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

1.4

Table 1 Experimental constants of (D-R) equation.

Adsorbent

W0 [kg kg ]

D [K ]

1.24
0.705

4.022  106
3.012  106

Maxsorb III
Activated charcoal

Temperature,C

1

70

0.8
0.6

80

0.4
90
0.2

Instrumentation

a
1

16

11

21

26

31

36

41

46

51

Equilibrium Pressure [kPa]

0.8

Temperature,C

20

30

50
60

40

0.6

W[kg kg-1]

The instruments used in the present study are: (i) two water
circulators of type CTP3000 that could provide the set
temperature within 0.1  C discrepancy, (ii) two water baths
of type TBN302DA, which are used together with the water
circulators to control the temperatures of evaporator and
adsorber; along with (iii) a series of type K thermocouples with
an uncertainty of 0.2  C, (iv) a pirani vacuum gauge of type
PG-D5A, (v) a digital telescope of type NRM-D-2XZ having
a minimum resolution of 0.01 mm, (vi) a micro-balance of type
PR8002 with a minimum resolution of 0.01 g, (vi) an oven,
and (iv) a Keithtly 2700 type data acquisition system.

70
0.4

80
90

0.2

b
1

11

16

21

26

31

36

41

46

51

Equilibrium Pressure [kPa]

1.4

Fig. 5 (a) - Adsorption isotherms of Maxsorb III/methanol

pair as predicted by using the D-R equation. (b) - Adsorption
isotherms of activated charcoal/methanol pair as predicted
by using the D-R equation.

Tevap=5C
Tevap=10C
Tevap=15C
(D-R)-Equation

1.2
1

W [kg kg-1]

50

40

60

0.8
0.6

2.3.

0.4
0.2
0
15

a
20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

Adsorbent Temperature [C]

0.8
Tevap=5C
Tevap=10C
Tevap=15C
(D-R)-Equation

0.6

W [kg kg-1]

30

area of 3150 m g , and granular activated carbon of type

Tsurumi Coal HC-20C supplied by Tsurumi Coal Co. Ltd, Japan.
Methanol of purity 99.95% has been used as the refrigerant.

2.2.

20

1.2

2

W[kg kg-1]

1

0.4

0.2

0
15

b
20

25

30

35

40

45

50

55

60

65

Adsorbent Temperature [C]

Fig. 4 (a) - Adsorption isobars for Maxsorb III/methanol
pair at assorted evaporator temperatures. (b) - Adsorption
isobars for activated charcoal/methanol pair at assorted
evaporator temperatures.

Procedure

Prior to each adsorption test, a sample of adsorbent typically

16 g was weighed using the micro-balance. The sample was
then placed into the oven and degasified under a temperature
of 120  C for about 12 h to ensure a thorough degasification
process. After that, the dry sample was weighed once again
and instantly placed into the adsorber. The sample was then
regenerated under vacuum conditions for several hours at
a temperature of 60  C where the valves connecting the
evaporator and the adsorber were kept closed. The adsorber
was then cooled to the required adsorption temperature until
the system stabilized.
A series of experiments were conducted at three evaporator temperatures namely 5, 10 and 15  C, respectively. At
each evaporator temperature, the adsorber temperature
varied over a range from 20 to 60  C with a temperature
interval of 10  C. Prior and after each experiment, the refrigerant height inside the evaporator was measured accurately
using the digital telescope from which the mass of evaporated
refrigerant was then estimated. The mass of adsorbed refrigerant is the difference between the mass of evaporated
refrigerant and the mass of refrigerant vapor trapped inside
the plumbing and the adsorber void volume.
To avoid any condensation during the adsorption process,
the connecting tubes between the evaporator and the
adsorber were mounted with a tap heater maintaining the

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

Table 2 Comparison between predicated and measured adsorption equilibrium of the assorted adsorbent/refrigerant
pairs.
Maxsorb III

Activated charcoal
1

Evaporator
Adsorber
Adsorption equilibrium [kg kg ] Percentage Adsorption equilibrium [kg kg1] Percentage
temperature [ C] temperature [ C]
of error [%]
of error [%]
Exp.
Pre.
Exp.
Pre.
15

20
30
40
50
60

1.1620
1.0200
0.6553
0.3507
0.1540

1.2094
0.9889
0.6662
0.3624
0.1604

4.07
3.04
1.65
3.31
4.16

0.6685
0.5919
0.4380
0.2888
0.1492

0.6865
0.5850
0.4369
0.2804
0.1537

2.70
1.15
0.23
2.92
3.01

10

20
30
40
50
60

1.1438
0.8152
0.4818
0.2286
0.0908

1.1098
0.8022
0.4767
0.2310
0.0908

2.97
1.59
1.04
1.02
0.00

0.6500
0.5164
0.3375
0.1971
0.1002

0.6456
0.5074
0.3402
0.1988
0.0983

0.67
1.72
0.80
0.85
1.87

20
30
40
50
60

0.9493
0.5952
0.3229
0.1350
0.0443

0.9545
0.6109
0.3178
0.1317
0.0449

0.54
2.62
1.58
2.43
1.37

0.5873
0.4068
0.2586
0.1326
0.0601

0.5708
0.3948
0.2497
0.1294
0.0587

2.81
2.93
3.46
2.43
2.33

Exp.: experimental, Pre.: predicted.

tube surface temperature at least 10  C higher than that of the

evaporator temperature.

3.

adsorption temperature T. The term D is an adsorption

parameter that depends on the adsorbent/adsorbate pair. The
numerical values of W0 and D were evaluated experimentally
by the linearization of Eq. (1) where (T ln(Ps/P))2 is fitted versus
70

Results and discussion

60C

The Dubinin Raduskevich (D-R) equation Eq. (1) is used to fit

the adsorption isotherms of Maxsorb III/methanol and activated charcoal/methanol pairs;

P 2 
s
W W0 exp  D T ln
P


(1)

Temperature [C]

60

where W stands for the equilibrium uptake and W0 is the

maximum uptakes in kg kg1. P is the equilibrium pressure
and Ps is the saturation pressure corresponding to the

50C

50

40C

40
30

30C

20

20C

10
0

a
0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90 100 110 120 130

Time [min]
1.2

70

Temperature [C]

0.8

W[kg kg-1]

60C

60

0.6
0.4

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

160

Time [min]
Fig. 6 Equilibrium uptake versus time for Maxsorb III/
methanol and activated charcoal/methanol pairs at the
assorted evaporator temperatures.

30C

30

20C

20

b
0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Time [min]

0
0

40C

40

10

Maxsorb III -Tevap=15C

Maxsorb III -Tevap=5C
Activated charcoal-Tevap=15C
Activated charcoal-Tevap=5C

0.2

50C

50

180

Fig. 7 (a) - Temperature profile of adsorption bed for

Maxsorb III/methanol at assorted adsorption
temperatures. (b) - Temperature profile of adsorption bed
for activated charcoal/methanol at assorted adsorption
temperatures.

1584

international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

ln(W ) as shown in Fig. 3(a) and (b). The goodness of the D-R
equation fitting for both of the assorted pairs can be seen from
Fig. 3(a) and (b), where the values of r2 are found to be more
than 0.999. The numerical values of W0 and D for both of
Maxsorb III/methanol and activated charcoal/methanol pairs
are furnished in Table 1.
Fig. 4(a) shows the isobars of Maxsorb III/methanol pair at
three evaporator temperatures namely 5, 10 and 15  C those
are corresponding to the evaporator pressures of 5.5, 7.4 and
9.9 kPa, respectively. During conducting the experiments, the
adsorption temperature varies between 20 and 60  C. The
isobars of activated charcoal/methanol at the same operating
conditions are also presented in Fig. 4(b). It is clear from Fig. 4(a)
and (b) that there is a good agreement between the measured
adsorption isotherms and those predicted by using the D-R

0.5
0.3
0.1

Pc

Pc

ion

at
tur

1
0.01

Sa

10

Pe
2

Pressure [kPa]

Pressure [kPa]

0.7

100

0.9 0.7

1.1

100

equation. Design codes of adsorption chiller must be equipped

with the correct isotherms, isosteric heat of adsorption and the
coefficients for the uptake model (El-Sharkawy et al., 2006b).
Theoretical prediction of adsorption isotherms of the adsorbent/refrigerant pair is therefore essential to evaluate the
system performance and to simulate its dynamic behavior.
Employing Eq. (1) coupled with the numerical values of W0 and
D which are shown in Table 1, adsorption isotherms of Maxsorb III/methanol and activated charcoal/methanol pairs are
predicted and presented in Fig. 5(a) and (b), respectively. To
validate the present isotherm model, the predicted adsorption
equilibrium using D-R equation along with the raw experimental data and the percentage of error are listed in Table 2. It
can be seen from Table 2 that the absolute value of maximum
error is below 5%.

1
-5

15

25

35

45

55

65

75

85

0.01
3

0.6

b
-5

15

25

35

0.1
0.05

c
15

25

35

75

85

95

0.3

0.4

0.2

Pressure [kPa]

Pressure [kPa]

tu

65

0.2

io
rat

Pevap

-5

55

100

0.3

45

0.5 0.4

10

Temperature [C]

100

Sa

Pevap

Temperature [C]

Pc

10

95

45

55

65

75

85

Pc
10

0.1

0.05

Pevap
2

d
-5

15

25

35

45

55

65

75

85

95

Temperature [C]
0.3

100

Pressure [kPa]

95

on

ati

tur

Sa

Temperature [C]

Sa

0.25
0.2
0.15
0.1

on

ati

tur

Pc

0.05

10

Pevap
3

0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1

ion

rat

tu
Sa

Pc

0.5

0.6

e
-5

15

25

35

45

55

65

75

85

95

Temperature [C]
Fig. 8 Pressuretemperatureconcentration (PTW ) diagrams of (a) Maxsorb III/methanol, (b) activated charcoal/methanol,
(c) LH/methanol, (d) DEG/methanol, and (e) AC-35/methanol pairs where the respective adsorption cooling cycle is
superimposed.

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

Table 3 Adsorption uptake and cycle performance of the assorted adsorbents using methanol as a working fluid for airconditioning application where adsorption and evaporation temperatures are fixed at 30 and 7 8C, respectively.
Regeneration temperature [ C]
1

Maxsorb III

Activated charcoal

LH

DEG

AC-35

60

Wmax [kJ kg ]
Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.688
0.544
164
0.63

0.453
0.380
83
0.56

0.355
0.301
61.2
0.51

0.266
0.236
33
0.40

0.284
0.262
24
0.323

70

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.688
0.287
457
0.76

0.453
0.236
248
0.72

0.355
0.206
170
0.68

0.266
0.180
97
0.58

0.284
0.211
83
0.544

80

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.688
0.127
640
0.78

0.453
0.128
371
0.76

0.355
0.137
249
0.72

0.266
0.135
149
0.63

0.284
0.211
144
0.62

90

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.688
0.047
731
0.79

0.453
0.061
448
0.77

0.355
0.890
304
0.73

0.266
0.100
189
0.65

0.284
0.110
199
0.657

Fig. 6 shows the variation of instantaneous adsorption

uptake with time for both of Maxsorb III/methanol and activated charcoal/methanol pairs at two evaporator temperatures namely 5 and 15  C. For the evaporator temperature of
15  C, one can notice from Fig. 6 that the Maxsorb III can adsorb
methanol as high as 1 kg kg1 within about 160 min whilst 1 kg
of activated charcoal specimen can adsorb about 0.6 kg of
methanol within a time duration of about 100 min. This means
that adsorption equilibrium of Maxsorb III/methanol is about
67% higher than that of activated charcoal/methanol pair.
Fig. 7(a) and (b) show the temporal history of the bed center
for both of Maxsorb III and activated charcoal adsorption beds.
During conducting the adsorption experiments the evaporator
temperature is kept constant at 15  C whilst the adsorption
temperature varies between 20 and 60  C with an increment of
10  C. It can be seen from Fig. 7(a) and (b) that, the bed center
temperature increases rapidly at the beginning of the

adsorption process, it then gradually decreases until reaching

the equilibrium condition. It is also worthy to notice that, for
both of the assorted adsorbent/refrigerant pairs the maximum
difference between the bed center temperature and the water
bath temperature decreases with the increase of adsorption
temperature. This is due to the fact that the amount of
methanol adsorbed and hence the amount of heat librated is
relatively higher at the early stage of adsorption process.
The pressuretemperatureconcentration (PTW ) diagram
provides the relationships between the adsorption
temperatures, equilibrium uptake and equilibrium pressure
which make it possible to evaluate the performance of
adsorption cooling cycles. Fig. 8(a) and (b) show the PTW
diagram for Maxsorb III/methanol and activated charcoal/
methanol pairs, respectively, where adsorption cooling
cycle is superimposed therein. Using the isothermal data
provided by Passos et al. (1986), the PTW diagrams of

Table 4 Adsorption uptake and cycle performance of the assorted adsorbents using methanol as a working fluid for icemaking application; adsorption and evaporation temperatures are 30 and L5 8C, respectively.
Regeneration temperature [ C]
1

Maxsorb III

Activated charcoal

LH

DEG

AC-35

80

Wmax [kJ kg ]
Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.247
0.127
137
0.60

0.211
0.128
94
0.54

0.190
0.137
61
0.45

0.171
0.135
40
0.36

0.200
0.158
48
0.39

90

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.247
0.047
228
0.67

0.211
0.061
170
0.64

0.190
0.090
116
0.56

0.171
0.100
81
0.48

0.200
0.110
103
0.53

100

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.247
0.015
265
0.68

0.211
0.026
211
0.66

0.190
0.057
153
0.59

0.171
0.072
112
0.53

0.200
0.071
147
0.58

110

Wmax [kJ kg1]

Wmin [kJ kg1]
SCE [kJ kg1]
COP []

0.247
0.004
277
0.67

0.211
0.010
229
0.66

0.190
0.035
177
0.60

0.171
0.052
135
0.55

0.200
0.043
179
0.60

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international journal of refrigeration 32 (2009) 15791586

three types of activated carbon/methanol pairs namely

AC-35/methanol, LH/methanol and DEG/methanol pairs
have also generated and presented in Fig. 8(c)(e), respectively. In the PTW diagrams of the all five pairs, the paths 1 /
2, 2 / 3, 3 / 4 and 4 / 1 show respectively the pre-cooling,
adsorption, pre-heating and desorption processes. For the sake
of comparison, a time-independent model (El-Sharkawy et al.,
2008) is used to estimate the performance of adsorption cooling
cycles employing the five assorted pairs and the theoretical
results have been furnished in Table 3. It is found that, at
a regeneration temperature of 80  C along with adsorption and
evaporator temperatures of 30 and 7  C, respectively, the Maxsorb III/methanol pair achieves an SCE as high as about
640 kJ kg1, whilst activated charcoal/methanol, LH/methanol
and DEG/methanol and AC-35/methaol provide 58%, 38%, 23%
and 22.5% of the SCE value of Maxsorb III/methanol pair,
respectively. This is because the Maxsorb III/methanol based
adsorption cooling cycle posses highest possible concentration
difference (Wmax  Wmin) among all other pairs at the same
operating conditions (see Table 3). Moreover, the Maxsorb III/
methanol pair posses the highest COP in comparison with that
of other pairs. As for ice-making application where the evaporation temperature is kept constant at 5  C, the values of SCE
and COP at various regeneration temperatures of the assorted
pairs are evaluated and furnished in Table 4. Theoretical
calculations show that Maxsorb III/methanol pair still posses
the highest SCE and COP. However the cycle should be driven by
a relatively higher regeneration temperature to produce
sensible cooling production.

4.

Conclusions

Adsorption equilibriums of methanol onto Maxsorb III and

Tsurumi activated charcoal have been experimentally investigated. It is found that the (D-R) equation is the most appropriate adsorption isotherm model to correlate the adsorption
equilibriums for the both assorted adsorbent/refrigerant
pairs. Experimental results show that adsorption equilibrium
of Maxsorb III/methanol pair is about 72% higher than that of
activated charcoal/methanol pair at evaporation temperature
of 15  C along with an adsorption of temperature 30  C. For the
sake of comparison, the change of SCE and COP with regeneration temperatures for Maxsorb III/methanol, activated
charcoal/methanol, LH/methanol, DEG/methanol and AC-35/
methanol pairs have been studied. Theoretical results show
that the superiority of Maxsorb III/methanol pair among other
carbonaceous adsorbent/methanol pairs for both of airconditioning and ice-making applications.

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