This paper presents the energy and exergy analysis of drying process in a semi-industrial continuous
band dryer. Experiments were performed on thin layer drying of carrot slices with thickness of 5 mm,
at air temperatures of 50, 60 and 70 C, drying air mass flow rates of 0.61, 1.22 and 1.83 kg/s and feeding
rates of 2.98 104, 3.48 104 and 4.16 104 kg/s. The effects of drying variables were evaluated on
weight loss of dried products, energy utilization, energy utilization ratio, exergy loss and exergy efficiency.
An amount of 250 g of fresh material was used on each band for drying experiments and the
weight loss of dried samples were found to be in the range of 51.6–84.4% of initial weight. The energy
utilization and energy utilization ratio varied between 3.78–25.57 kJ/s and 0.1554–0.3752, respectively.
The exergy loss and exergy efficiency were found to be in the range of 0.6677–14.1577 kJ/s and 0.5527–
0.9329, respectively.