KEYWORDS
Solar cooling, solar refrigeration, absorption, solar collectors.
Refrigeration is available in the industrialised countries through the availability of electricity but is not
readily available in the major part of the world. An alternative solution for this problem is solar energy,
available in most areas and it represents a good source of thermal energy; the combination of solar energy
with absorption, adsorption, desiccant, and others technologies less studied for refrigeration are being
investigated and improved around the world.
Many arrangements or cycles are possible: solar collectors can be used to provide energy for absorption
cooling, desiccant cooling, and Rankine-vapour compression cycles. Solar hybrid cooling systems are also
possible. The concept of cooling is appealing because the cooling load is roughly in phase with solar energy
availability. Although a large potential market exists for this technology, existing solar cooling systems are
not competitive with electricity-driven or gas-fired air-conditioning systems because of their high first
costs. Lowering the cost of components and improving their performance could reduce the cost of solar
cooling systems. Improvements such as reduced collector area because of improved system performance
and reduced collector cost will lower the cost of solar components.
Several solar driven refrigeration have been proposed and are under development such as sorption systems
including liquid/vapour and solid/vapour absorption, adsorption, vapour compression systems,
photovoltaic/vapour compression, adsorption; but most of them are economically justified.