High-Performance Cascade Sorption Thermal Storage Battery for Long-Term Applications in Cold Regions

Abstract

The sorption thermal battery (STB) is a promising thermal energy storage technology for long-term heating applications. Recent research has focused on the use of an ammonia-based STB for cold regions, while a three-phase water-based STB offers a remarkably high energy storage density (ESD) through crystallization sorption. However, the three-phase STB faces limitations in terms of lower evaporator temperatures due to water freezing. To address this issue, a cascade three-phase STB (CSTB) is proposed, which consists of two sorption subsystems. The ammonia sorption subsystem upgrades the low ambient temperature and is used to boost the discharging pressure of the three-phase sorption subsystem, resulting in a high-temperature lift and a large concentration glide. A comprehensive thermodynamic evaluation is carried out when different working pairs are considered. The results show that the proposed CSTB attains the highest ESD (1456 kJ·kg–1) and discharging temperature (105 °C) with CaCl2–NH3/LiCl–H2O and a better coefficient of performance (COPh; 0.51) with LiCl–H2O/BaCl2–NH3. The ESD of the proposed STB exceeds that of the double-stage STB (663 kJ·kg–1) by more than 1.7 times, while the conventional STB cannot operate with ambient, discharging, and charging temperatures of −10, 55, and 90 °C, respectively. The overall performance makes the proposed CSTB promising for domestic heating and heat transformer applications even in severe cold regions.

Multiphase Transportation, Conversion, & Utilization of Energy in Chemical Engineering: A Special Issue for MTCUE-2022

“…At higher temperatures, oil production increased and then decreased, with 500 °C favoring the production of light distillates. Mehari et al upgraded three-phase water-based sorption thermal battery (STB) in cold regions. The novel cascade three-phase STB (CSTB) consists of two adsorption subsystems, which were driven by the ammoniated salt sorption subsystem and coupled together by the internal heat recovery process.…”