Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443

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Energy and Buildings
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Experimental investigation of air conditioning system using
evaporative cooling condenser
Tianwei Wang
a,
, Chenguang Sheng
a,b
, A.G. Agwu Nnanna
a,b
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University Calumet, 2200 169th ST, Hammond, IN 46323, USA
b
Purdue Calumet Water Institute, Purdue University Calumet, 2200 169th ST, Hammond, IN 46323, USA
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 23 December 2013
Received in revised form30 May 2014
Accepted 26 June 2014
Available online 5 July 2014
Keywords:
Direct evaporative cooling
HVAC&R
COP
Evaporation efciency
Cost-benet
a b s t r a c t
This paper presents an experimental investigation of the Coefcient of Performance (COP)s augmenta-
tion of an air conditioning system utilizing an evaporative cooling condenser. The experimental facility
consisted of four major components, which are, the compressor, the evaporator, the thermal expansion
valve, and the condenser. An evaporative cooling unit was located upstream from the condenser. Thermal
parameters, such as relative humidity, dry bulb temperature, and wet bulb temperature were measured
to evaluate the effect of in-direct evaporative cooling on the systems COP. The results indicated an inverse
relation between the condenser inlet dry bulb temperature and the COP. The changes in specic enthalpy
of the air across the evaporative cooled condenser were due to latent heat transfer and sensible heat
exchanges, whereas the specic enthalpy changes for the conventional condenser were primarily caused
by sensible heat exchanges. By using the evaporative cooling condenser to pre-cool the air, the saturation
temperature drop through the condenser increased from 2.4

C to 6.6

C. It also resulted in an increase of

the mass owrate of refrigerant that went into the evaporator. This mass increase of liquid entering the
evaporator consequently resulted in the increase of COP from 6.1% to 18%. A power reduction up to 14.3%
on the compressor was also achieved. The result reveals the relation between water consumption and
compressor energy saving regarding to their costs. Although greater power reductions were fullled at
higher dry bulb temperatures, in this circumstance, the cost-optimal applicable temperature is around
33.1

C.
2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
The continuous increase in energy demand and the decline in
global energy supply have resulted in high energy costs. In 2008, it
was reportedthat 20%of total energy inthe USAand17%of the total
global energy were consumed in air conditioning [1,2]; hence, the
enhancement of the COP of air conditioning systemwill contribute
to the reduction of global energy consumption.
The condensing units in air conditioning systems have sig-
nicant inuence on the compressor discharge pressure. Most
condensers are air cooled and their performances are governed
by heat transfer to the surrounding air. The thermal stability of
air-cooled condensers uctuates throughout the year, especially
during the summer when surrounding air temperature is high. The
refrigerant owing through the condenser may not fully condense
in a high temperature environment resulting in a mixture of liquid

Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 312 731 0677; fax: +1 219 989 3128.
E-mail address: tianwei0512@gmail.com(T. Wang).
and vapor entering the Thermal Expansion Valve (TXV) and conse-
quently decreasing COP. The key to COP enhancement is to reduce
the average surrounding air temperature. Vrachopoulos et al. [3]
investigatedawater evaporationsystemtoanair-cooledcondenser
by spraying water mist into the air owupstreamto the condenser.
They reported a COP enhancement of 210% and the need for an
installation of a water droplet collector to avoid condenser erosion
and a subsequent ventilation power increase. Hasan and Siren [4]
tested two evaporative heat exchangers with n-tube and bare-
tube. Their model and experiment revealed that the n-tube had
a higher thermal efciency than the bare-tube. The dry-n surface
had greater n efciency than wetted-n surface, which indicated
the weakness of a water-spray system when the mist adheres
on n surface. Hajidavalloo and Eghtedari [5] and Aglawe et al.
[6] performed a test on a window-air-conditioner with evapora-
tive cooling media surrounding the condensing coil. Experimental
result showed a 16% decrease in power consumption. Manske et al.
[7] investigated the control strategy on an industrial refrigeration
system with an evaporative condenser model. Their simulation
demonstrated an 11% annual reduction in energy consumption.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enbuild.2014.06.047
0378-7788/ 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
436 T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443
Nomenclature
CV conventional air conditioning system
COP coefcient of performance
COP
DEC
coefcient of performance with DEC
COP
CV
coefcient of performance without DEC
DEC directive evaporative cooling
g gravity
h
ai
enthalpy of air at DEC inlet [kJ/kg]
h
fg
enthalpy of evaporation [kJ/kg]
h
ao,DEC
enthalpy of air at DEC outlet [kJ/kg]
h
ao,c
enthalpy of air at condenser outlet [kJ/kg]
h
r,ci
enthalpy of refrigerant at condenser inlet [kJ/kg]
h
r,co
enthalpy of refrigerant at condenser outlet [kJ/kg]
h
x
specic enthalpy, x =1, 2, 3, 4 represent the location
[kJ/kg]
m
ai
mass owrate of vapor at DEC inlet [kg/h]
m
ao,DEC
mass owrate of vapor at DEC outlet [kg/h]
m
ao,c
mass owrate of vapor at condenser outlet [kg/h]
m
r
refrigerant owmass owrate [kg/h]
m
w,e
evaporation rate of water [kg/h]
P
c
refrigerant pressure at discharge [kPa]
P
sat
refrigerant pressure saturation pressure [kPa]

Q
evap
cooling capacity [kW]
Q water consumption [ml/h]
S
DEC
refrigerant entropy change through condenser with
DEC [kJ/kg-K]
S
CV
refrigerant entropy change through condenser
without DEC [kJ/kg-K]
TXV thermal expansion valve
T
dbi
dry bulb temperature of air at DEC inlet [

C]
T
dbo
dry bulb temperature of air at DEC outlet [

C]
T
wbi
wet-bulb temperature of air at DEC inlet
T
wi
inlet water temperature [

C]
T
wo
drained water temperature [

C]
T
sat,DEC
refrigerant saturate temperature with DEC [

C]
T
sat,CV
refrigerant saturate temperature without DEC [

C]

W
isen
isentropic work of compressor [kW]

W
act
actual work of compressor [kW]

W
irr
irreversible work of compressor [kW]
W work difference of compressor [kW]

W work of compressor [kW]

W
p
power consumption of water pump [kW]
COP enhancement
cost ratio of
Price of water comsupiton
Price of total engery saved

e
price of electricity [$/kW-hr]

w
price of water [$/m
3
]
q owcapacity [m
3
/h]
density of uid [kg/m
3
]
h differential head [m]

p
pump efciency
relative humidity ratio
Subscripts
a air
c condenser
db dry bulb
e evaporation
evap evaporator
i inlet
o outlet
r refrigerant
w water
wb wet bulb
EI-Dessouky et al. [8] carried out experiments on a two-stage evap-
orative cooler with Direct Evaporative Cooling (DEC) and Indirect
Evaporative Cooling (IEC). Their work revealed that DEC performed
better than IEC under the same condition by using air temperature
drop as the evaluation parameter. Youbi-Idrissi et al. [9], in their
work on simulation of a spray evaporative condenser, reported an
11%increaseincapacityandalsorevealedanupper theoretical limit
of the spray rate to assure efciency. Pongsakorn et al. [10] studied
an inverter air conditioner with an evaporative cooled condenser.
They tested the system under multiple water spray rates and fre-
quencies with three different temperature scales in xed ambient
temperature. As a result, up to 35% increase of COP was achieved
at a lower water spray rate of 100L/h and a higher frequency of
8090Hz. Delfani et al. [11] appliedIECtoa packagedunit air condi-
tioner. Under local conditions, theywereabletoachieveanincrease
in a cooling load up to 75% and a reduction in electrical energy
consumption of 55%.
Review of the above literature revealed that the thermal
enhancement of air conditioning systems can be achieved using
an evaporative cooling device, with very strong results. How-
ever, there is a lack of study of commercial sized system as well
as their real applications. Moreover, very limited work has been
reported on the pressureenthalpy (ph) or temperatureentropy
(TS) relationshipof the overall hybridDEC-condenser system. This
information is important in order to gain the insight of the impact
of evaporative cooling on major air conditioning components such
as thermal expansion valve, compressor, and evaporator. Further-
more, the DEC evaporation efciency and the cost-benet analysis
of an evaporative cooling condenser systemhave received minimal
attention. This information is needed for efcient design, perfor-
mance characterization, and application of DEC-Condenser to air
conditioning systems. In this paper, an experimental investigation
was conducted on hybrid DEC-condenser located in a full-scale
air-conditioning system. The DEC was located upstreamto the con-
denser. The condenser fan was set equal to residential condenser
air speed. Thermodynamic properties such as relative humidity,
dry-bulb and wet-bulb temperature, and water temperature were
measured under steady-state condition for various simulated out-
side air temperature conditions.
Unlike other studies, the experiments in this paper were car-
ried out using residential sized condenser and evaporator. All the
experimental parameters, such as, air velocity, water owrate, and
dry-bulb temperature, were set consistent with design standards
and commercially available air conditioning system. Therefore,
results obtainedfromthis studyhas practical engineeringrelevance
and could be directly used in HVAC design. The water temperature
were controlled such that the heat transfer process was dominated
by latent heat exchange as is the case in practical DEC systems. The
costbenet analysis performed in this paper provides information
to HVAC designers attempting to integrate DEC into a conventional
air conditioning system to increase cooling capacity and lower
power consumption.
2. Experimental apparatus
Theexperimental systemcouldbesplit intotwoparts: aconven-
tional air-cooled refrigeration systemusing R-410A coolant and an
evaporative pre-cooling systemwith a temperature control device.
The combination of condenser and evaporative pre-cooling system
was regarded as the outdoor unit, while the evaporator was con-
sidered as the indoor unit, as depicted in Fig. 1. The refrigeration
unit was driven by a 7.4kW scroll compressor, with an evapora-
tor capacity of 5.3kW to 7kW. The dimension of the evaporator
was 48cm61cm2 rows 3.15 FPCM, while the capacity of the
condenser was 11kWand its dimension was 63.5cm76.2cm2
T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443 437
Fig. 1. Experimental setup.
rows 3.15 FPCM. Both the evaporator and condenser were man-
ufactured for residential usage. Refrigerant accumulators were
placed in both liquid line and suction line to sustain the system.
Pressure sensors were installed inside the copper pipe that carries
the refrigerant, while thermocouples were attached on the surface
of copper pipe for temperature measurement. All the pipes were
thermally insulated to minimize heat loss to the surroundings. Two
240W fans were installed to supply the air to the condenser and
evaporator. The fan speeds were set at 1.6m/s and 1.14m/s for the
evaporator and the condenser, respectively. The air speeds were
selectedtomimic that of conventional residential refrigerationunit
[1214]. Two electrical heaters 10kW and 14kW were located
downstream from the fans to alter the inlet air temperature and
vary the heating load conditions. The air temperature ranged from
2250

C and 2246

C for the evaporator and condenser, respec-

tively. The air temperature and relative humidity were monitored
and recorded at pre-determined locations as depicted in Fig. 2. All
the temperature points have an uncertainty of 0.6

C, pressure are
measured within 1.5% uncertainty, water ow is read with 2%
uncertainty, and voltage and current of compressor have 1V and
0.1A uncertainty, respectively. A set of experiments at a speci-
ed condenser condition was carried out to ensure reproducibility
of experimental data. A set of experiments consists three tests run
under the same condition, and they had temperature readings var-
ied within an average of 0.3

C.
A Digital Plus RTE 17 Bath Circulator was used as a water
reservoir to supply water to the cooling DEC pads. The water tem-
peratures before and after the cooling pad were regulated such that
the inlet temperature, T
wi
, was equal tothe outlet temperature, T
wo
.
This minimized sensible heat transfer to the water and guaranteed
that major parts of the thermal exchange between the cooling pad
and air were by latent heat, which could better reect the system
behaviors in reality. Assuming negligible heat loss to the surround-
ing, the sensible heat loss fromthe air (mc
p
dT)
air
was equal to the
latent heat gain (mh
fg
)
w
of the water.
A nozzle, fabricated in-house, with 13 spray holes at an equal
distance of 2cm located above the cooling pad supplied water at
a constant volumetric ow rate of 0.273m
3
/h. The water dripped
and saturated the pad. Excess water beyond that needed for sat-
urated of the pad was recovered via a water sump, and was
re-circulated.
The evaporative coolingpadwas manufacturedfromporous cel-
lulosic paper which allowed air to enter from its frontal side and
to leave fromits back side. Water entered fromthe top of the cool-
ing pad, saturated the pad, and the excess liquid water exited from
the bottom. The mediumhas a dry weight of 28.8kg/m
3
and a wet
weight of 56.1kg/m
3
, andthe porosity was 91.2%for the entire wet-
tedmedium. Themediumporositywas measuredbyimmersingthe
medium100% into a fully lled water tank, and then took the pro-
portion of the volume difference between mediumand overowto
the mediumvolume [15].
Fig. 2. Experimental setup.
438 T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443
3. Experiment procedure
The conventional air-cooled refrigeration systems with and
without the evaporative cooled condenser were tested for compar-
ative analysis of their cooling performance. The tests were carried
out at an evaporator dry-bulb and wet-bulb temperatures of 27

C
and 17.6

C, respectively, which corresponded to the maximum

temperatures at work places, according to ASHRAE standard [16].
The condenser inlet air dry bulb temperatures were set at 23.8

C,
27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C to imitate the seasonal outdoor

conditions.
The experiment started with activation of the conventional
refrigeration systems without evaporative-cooled condenser. Data
acquired from this test provided the base line reference for the
system performance. The system was operated for 40min until it
reached a steady state condition, as the pressure and temperature
in the refrigeration cycle no longer increase or decrease, then data
were collected for analysis. The frequency of data collection was
every 2s for a duration of 5min. The data collected included the
refrigerant pressure and temperature across major refrigeration
components, air dry-bulb temperature, humidity ratio, and power
consumption of the compressor.
The second part of the experiment began with an activation of
the evaporative cooled condenser. Water was pumped via a nozzle
to the top of the cooling pad, saturated the pad, and excess water
was re-circulated back to the water tank. The total time required
to saturate the pad was approximately 5min, and it took roughly
10min for the refrigeration systemto reach steady state again. Due
to evaporative losses, makeup water was periodically added to the
water tank. The total quantity of makeup water was regarded as
water was consumed by the DEC. This water consumption data was
later used to compute the cost of a DEC condenser system. Both the
inlet and outlet water temperature were monitored and recorded
throughout the experiment.
4. Results and discussion
The measured steady-state dry-bulb and wet-bulb tempera-
tures were used to construct the process lines in the psychometric
chart for the condenser outside air temperature conditions of
23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C38.9

Cand44.5

C. For brevity, only the pro-

cess line for 33.1

C was plotted in Fig. 3, and it shows the enthalpy

change across the conventional (without DEC, labeled by CV) and
evaporative cooled condenser (with DEC). It was observed that the
air temperature across the conventional condenser increased by
sensible heat transfer fromthe refrigerant as shown by process line
A to B while the humidity ratio remained constant. The heat that
released from the condenser to the air was originally because of
the refrigerant phase change. However, for the evaporative cooled
condenser, the air temperature was decreased from T
A
to T
C
with
corresponding increase in humidity ratio from
A
to
C
by latent
heat transfer due to evaporation of the water running through the
wetted mediumas depicted by process line A to C, which is a con-
stant enthalpy line or called an adiabatic process. The cooled air
exited the DEC and then passed through the condenser coil where
its temperature increased due to sensible heat exchange caused
by the heat released from the refrigerant in the condenser coil, as
depicted by process line C to D. Data from Fig. 3 showed that the
conventional condenser had the process line A-B while the evapo-
rative cooled condenser had the process line of A-C-D.
During the evaporative cooling process, heat from the air was
transferred to the surrounding water attracted by the wetted
Fig. 3. Psychometric changes of the condenser air at 33.1C test.
T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443 439
Fig. 4. Air temperature through Evaporator and Condenser at 33.1C.
Table 1
Comparison of enthalpy of air for conventional and DEC system.
T
db
(

C) 23.80 27.80 33.10 38.90 44.50

h
CV
8.86 8.86 7.76 6.55 4.64
h
DEC
10.07 12.18 10.77 11.28 11.28
cooling pad surface, the behavior resulted in sensible heat loss
from the air and correspondingly latent heat gain by the water.
This process can be mathematically explained with the following
assumptions: negligible conduction heat transfer between the air
and water, no heat loss to the surroundings, negligible change in
kinetic and potential energy. The energy equation that described
the thermal exchange between the air and the evaporative cooling
systemcan be expressed as:
m
w,e
h
fg
= m
ao,DEC
h
ao,DEC
m
ai
h
ai
= m
a
c
p
(T
ao,DEC
T
ai
) (1)
Eq. (1) showed that the loss of sensible heat in the air was equal
to the gain of latent heat in the water. Eq. (2) described the heat
exchange betweenthe air across the condenser and the condensing
refrigerant. The heat exchange during condensation of the refrig-
erant was equal to the sensible heat gain of the air.
m
r
(h
r,ci
h
r,co
) = m
ao,c
h
ao,c
m
ao,DEC
h
ao,DEC
= m
a
c
p
(T
ao,c
T
ao,DEC
)
(2)
The temperature difference, T
ao,c
T
ao,DEC
, in Eq. (2) was exper-
imentally measured for various condenser outside temperature
conditions and was plotted in Fig. 4 for both the conventional
labeled without DEC and evaporative cooling condenser labeled
with DEC. Data in Fig. 4 showed that the air temperature leaving
the condenser was 5

C lower for the evaporative condenser than

for the conventional. This temperature difference could contribute
to sub-cooling of the refrigerant leaving the condenser andenhanc-
ing the system performance. Furthermore, the enthalpy changes
in Eq. (2) were calculated and presented in Table 1. Table 1 fur-
ther indicated that the enthalpy change of air across condenser has
been increased by the application of evaporative cooling. Data in
Table 1 showed that the enthalpy change in the air was a weak
function of the outside air temperature for the evaporative cooled
condenser, but a strong function of outside air temperature for
the conventional condenser. The change in enthalpy of the air for
evaporative condenser varied from 10 to 12kJ/kg for correspond-
ing the outside air temperature range of 2345

C. Under the same

outside condition, the change in enthalpy of air for conventional
condenser decreased from9 to 5kJ/kg.
Table 2 presented the thermodynamic properties of the refrig-
erant at various states for condenser inlet dry bulb temperatures:
23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C. The subscripts, p
1
to p
4
and t
1
to t
4
, referred to the thermodynamic states. States 12 rep-
resented the compressor suction and discharge, states 23 referred
to inlet and exit conditions of the condenser, states 34 repre-
sented the condition across the TXV, and states 41 referred to
the inlet and exit condition across the evaporator. For each state,
the thermodynamic properties were measured for the evapora-
tive cooling and conventional condenser. The Data collected for
the conventional condenser was used as baseline for evaluating
the impact of evaporative cooling system. Data from Table 2 was
plotted in a ph diagram in Figs. 59. In Fig. 5, it was observed
that across the condenser, the discharge pressure for evaporative
cooling was 131kPa lower than the discharge pressure for conven-
tional condenser. The discharge pressure of the evaporative cooling
condenser was marginally below the saturation pressure, which
indicated sub-cooling. The TXV was a constant enthalpy process.
It was noted in Fig. 5 that the enthalpy of DEC was lower than
that of conventional by 4.4kJ/kg. This implied that the mass of liq-
uid entering the evaporator was higher for DEC than conventional
consequently DEC had higher cooling capacity. With the condenser
inlet air temperature increased to 27.8

C in Fig. 6, a larger dis-

charge pressure drop of DEC to conventional was observed as well
as a lower enthalpy into the evaporator. An analysis of data in
Figs. 610 consistently showed that DEC resulted in sub-cooling
of the refrigerant at the discharge of the condenser as evident by
the discharge pressure being lower than the saturation pressure
(P=P
c
P
sat
). The P=P
c
P
sat
was a function of the condenser
inlet air dry bulb temperature. For condenser inlet temperature of
23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C, the respective P were

5.8%, 8.9%, 11.5%, 12.9% and 13.9%.
Using data from Table 1, the TS diagram was plotted in
Figs. 1014 for condenser inlet air dry-bulb temperatures of
23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C, as in the ph diagram.
Figs. 1014 showed that the DEC resulted in a decreased com-
pressor discharge temperature and lower saturation temperature.
That is, T
sat,DEC
<T
sat,AC
. Similarly, the change in entropy across the
440 T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443
Table 2
Experiment results.
Test T
db
(

C) p1 (kPa) p2 (kPa) p3 (kPa) p4 (kPa) t1 (

C) t2 (

C) t3 (

C) t4 (

C) h1 (kJ/kg) h2 (kJ/kg) h3 (kJ/kg) h4 (kJ/kg)

1 23.8 CV 599.8 2259.6 2151.6 808.3 20.7 90.5 37.2 6.0 281.5 355.8 120.6 120.6
DEC 598.8 2128.6 2017.2 787.3 20.6 86.7 34.8 5.3 281.3 353.1 116.2 116.2
2 27.8 CV 622.3 2429.3 2321.6 842.8 21.1 94.8 40.3 7.1 281.9 358.7 126.1 126.1
DEC 596.1 2214.3 2103.8 800.7 20.5 36.4 36.4 5.7 281.5 354.2 119.1 119.1
3 33.1 CV 645.3 2657.5 2554.8 880.9 22.0 97.9 44.1 8.3 282.3 359.7 133.3 133.3
DEC 611.7 2353.5 2247.4 826.8 21.7 89.8 39.0 6.1 281.7 353.9 123.7 123.7
4 38.9 CV 662.3 2863.5 2764.6 912.7 22.7 103.2 47.3 9.3 282.6 363.7 139.6 139.6
DEC 624.6 2493.7 2389.1 851.0 22.1 93.9 41.4 7.4 282 357 128.2 128.2
5 44.5 CV 687.3 3061.5 2964.4 946.7 23.2 106.3 50.3 10.3 282.9 365.2 145.6 145.6
DEC 639.8 2635.5 2533.6 876.7 22.5 96.4 43.7 7.9 282.3 358.2 132.6 132.6
Figs. 59. Pressureenthalpy diagram.
compressor and condenser was lower with the DEC present. That
is, S
DEC
>S
AC
.
The effect of DEC can be determined by comparing the areas
underneath the TS diagrams in Figs. 1014.
In Fig. 10, the areas: A-B-C-D-E-A and A

-B

-C

-D

-E

-A

repre-
sented the work per unit mass done on the refrigerant by the
compressor for the conventional and DEC systems, respectively.
It was also equal to the heat transferred to the evapora-
tor minus the heat transferred from the condenser. That is,

E
D
T
sat
ds

C
B
T
sat
ds =

W
C
, where

q
dT
= ds. It canbeseenthat area
A-B-C-D-E-A>A

-B

-C

-D

-E

-A

hence the conventional required

more energy to compress the refrigerant than DEC, that is,
(

W
C
)
CV
>(

W
C
)
DEC
. Also, the change in entropy across the com-
pressor was higher for DEC than conventional, S
CV
>S
DEC
,
as evident in Figs. 1114. Since irreversibility of a process
increased with increase in entropy, therefore, S
CV
>S
DEC
,
implied that conventional has higher irreversible work than DEC
(

W
irr
=

W
isen

W
act
)
CV
>(

W
irr
=

W
isen

W
act
)
DEC
, where

W
isen
T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443 441
Figs. 1014. Temperatureentropy diagram.
was the isentropic work and

W
act
was the actual work. Data
from Figs. 1014 showed that the difference between S
DEC
and
S
CV
depended on psychometric properties of air owing into
the condenser. For condenser inlet dry bulb temperatures: 23.8

C,
27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C, Figs. 1115, the respective

entropy difference, S
DEC
S
CV
, is 2.2%, 5.0%, 6.6%, 6.4%, and
6.4%.
Based on the measured parameters given in Table 1, the coef-
cient of performance, COP, was determined, and is dened in terms
of the cooling capacity,

Q
evap
and the compressor work,

W, as
COP =

Q
evap

W
=
h
1
h
4
h
2
h
1
(3)
where

Q
evap
= m
R
(h
1
h
4
) (4)

W = m
R
(h
2
h
1
) (5)
Using Eqs. (3)(5), the COP
CV
and COP
DEC
were computed and
the results were presented in Table 2. Data in Table 2 showed an
Fig. 15. Water consumption and compressor saving.
enhancement in the COP using the DEC system. The percentage
enhancement of EC is dened as,
=
COP
DEC
COP
CV
COP
DEC
(6)
442 T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443
Table 3
Comparison of COP for conventional and DEC system.
T
db
(

C) 23.8 27.8 33.1 38.9 44.5

COP
CV
2.167 2.028 1.924 1.764 1.669
COP
DEC
2.300 2.232 2.191 2.052 1.97
Table 4
COP decrease at 25% cooling load.
T
db
(

C) 23.8 27.8 33.1 38.9 44.5

CV
45.3% 48.8% 42.5% 53.9% 51.1%

DEC
37.1% 43.5% 36% 33.6% 32%
Table 5
Ratio of cost.
T
db
(

C) 23.8 27.8 33.1 38.9 44.5

(E04) 1.007 0.624 0.541 0.681 0.711
and was calculated fromTable 3. It showed that 6.1% 18% and
that was a function of the inlet condenser dry-bulb temperatures:
23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C (Table 4).
The water evaporation efciency was expressed by wet-bulb
depression efciency as:
=
T
dbi
T
dbo
T
dbi
T
wbi
(7)
where T is temperature, subscript d and w are dry-bulb and wet
bulb, respectively. Table5showedthevariationof withanaverage
value of 75.5%.
The above analysis clearly showed that COP
DEC
>COP
CV
without
taking into consideration the mass of water used in the DEC as well
as the energy consumed by the water pump. This information is
needed in order to effectively appraise the efcacy of the DEC sys-
tem. In this paper, the water consumed by the DEC as well as work
of the compressor for both conventional and evaporative cooling
condenser were measured. The reduction in the compressor work,
dened by the difference between the work of the compressor for
the conventional condenser and the evaporative cooled condenser,
was plotted against the water consumed by the systemand shown
in Fig. 15.
The reduction in the compressor work increased with the water
consumption, hence the result in energy savings. For condenser
inlet temperature of 23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C, the
water consumption were 3260ml, 3760ml, 4280ml, 6840ml and
8030ml, while the energy savings were 100W, 191.1W, 252.6W,
322.4Wand 363.1W, respectively.
To further explore the actual cost of operating the evapora-
tive condenser and its associated benet, the cost ratio of water
consumed to energy saved was expressed as
=
Q
w
(W W
p
)
e
(8)
where
e
is the price of electricity, $/kW-hr,
w
is the price of water,
$/m
3
, and W
p
is the power consumption of the water pump and is
expressed as
W
p
=
q g h
3.6 10
6

(9)
where q was owcapacity, is density of the water, h is the differ-
ential head (0.5m), and is the pump efciency and is specied as
0.6 by the manufacturer. The
e
for the U.S in average for 2012 is
$0.12, while the
w
is varied from$0.09m
3
in hammond, Indiana
to $0.40m
3
in the U.S average.
Fig. 16 presented the the cost of water consumed by the evapo-
rative condenser and the compressor energy saved. As can be seen,
thebluebar representedthecost of savedenergyinthecompressor,
Fig. 16. Cost of water consumed vs cost of saved energy.
while the red and green bars indicated the cost of the comsumed
water to achieve the energy saving by using water price of the local
city of Hammond and the US average, respectively. Fig. 17 showed
that as the condenser inlet air temperature went up, more sav-
ings were achieved in compressor energy cost, while using DEC
cost less than the cost of electricity. For condenser inlet tempera-
ture of 23.8

C, 27.8

C, 33.1

C, 38.9

C and 44.5

C, the amount of
saved energy added up to $0.012, $0.023, $0.03, $0.039 and $0.044,
respectively, while the costs of consumed water were negligible.
Eq. (8) was calculated and presented in Table 5. It showed that
the lowest ratio, , was 0.541E04 at condenser air inlet tempre-
ture of 33.1

C, andwas therefore the optimiumratio. Alowvalue of

indicated high energy saving in money compared to water con-
sumed. It should be noted that the value of could vary depending
on geographical locations, nonetheless, an evaporative cooled con-
denser is considered economically effective if is less than unity.
For practical applications, the initial installation cost of DEC system
should be taken into consideration in the cost analysis. The mate-
rial, fabrication, andinstallationcost of the DECsysteminthis paper
was approximately $100. This cost is expected to decrease if the
DEC systemwas mass produced and the materials were purchased
in bulk fromthe manufacturer. The annual savings associated with
DEC depends on operational hours of an air conditioning system,
weather condition, and geographical location. The annual equiv-
alent full-load cooling operation hour for air conditioning system
that accounted for the aforementioned variables were estimated
using U.S EPA standard. According to EPA2002 [17], 683h annual
equivalent full-load cooling operation hour was reported for the
city of Chicago. Using this 683 operational hours, the calculated
annual saving for the DECsysteminChicagois $30per year. Accord-
ing to the manufacturer, Dial Manufacturing,Inc, DEC media has
a useful life of 3 years. It is calculated that the maintenance cost
is $8 per year. Therefore, the payback period is about 3 years for
the city of Chicago. In the southwestern region of the U.S, e.g., like
Dallas,TX, the full-load cooling operation time is 1962h, and the
paybackperiodcouldbereducedwithin2years. As aresult, it seems
more saving would be acheived with longer operation time under
current water price.
5. Conclusion
The experiments compared the effect of DEC condenser with
conventional air cooled condenser. By conducting multiple tests
on condenser driven conditions, the thermal performance in terms
of temperature showed that DEC could drive the systeminto sub-
cooled operation condition, resulting in the increase of saturation
temperature drop through the condenser from 2.4

C to 6.6

C. It
also increased the liquid mass ow that enters the evaporator,
reduced the compressor work, and consequently resulted in the
increase of COP from6.1% to 18%.
T. Wang et al. / Energy and Buildings 81 (2014) 435443 443
Furthermore, the DEC wet-bulb depression evaporation ef-
ciency has been calculated and the costbenet analysis of
evaporative cooling condenser system has been performed. The
results indicated that according to the current electricity price and
the water price in the U.S, the DEC could achieve up to 14.3% power
savings with negligible cost of operation; especially in the con-
denser inlet dry bulb temperature is around 33.1

C. Depending on
theregional usage, theDECsystemwouldgainapaybacktimerange
from two to three years. However, further study on the impact of
humidity to the DEC systemshould be carried out, because the eco-
nomic benet may be reduced for humid regions, as the efciency
of the cooling pad will decrease.
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