Study On The Air Cleaning Effect Of Silica Gel Rotors

This research aims to investigate the air cleaning effect of silica gel rotors, find and optimize the factors impacting on the air cleaning effect, and provide technical support for developing air processing technology with silica gel rotor as a component to offer thermal comfort environment and clean air.Two experiments were conducted to investigate the air cleaning effect of silica gel rotors. One experiment measured a rotor's ability to improve perceived air quality, and the other measured its ability to remove VOC pollutants. The results of both the experiments showed that the silica gel rotor was very effective to clean the indoor air. It was also reflected that the rotor was not selective to VOCs which had different chemical properties, and the rotor kept its air cleaning effect in parameters-changing desiccant cooling systems.Seeing to the variety of VOCs and the limit of experiments, a comprehensive transfer model of VOCs, heat and water in the rotor was built, so that the transfer mechanism and performance of all kinds of VOCs in the rotor could be predicted. It is suggested by the calculated results that the regeration time needs to be longer than the rotor only used to dehumidify air to fully desorb the VOCs on the rotor, and the regeneration temperature should as well be kept higher to get better air cleaning effect in the premise that thermal comfort indoor is ensured.The strategy to choose desiccant cooling equipment to get better air cleaning effect is offered at the end. Two kinds of desiccant cooling system which can take full advantage of the rotor's air cleaning effect are recommended, and the energy consumption of them is compared with traditional refrigeration air conditioning systems. It is found by calculation that the energy consumption based on heat of the desiccant cooling systems is lower than that of refrigeration air conditioning systems. When the fresh air rate of desiccant cooling systems is lowered to 25% of the original rate, the energy consumption of the two desiccant cooling systems reduced to 74% and 65% of the origin, while they can offer better air quality than the refrigeration system. But the two desiccant cooling systems consume more energy based on electricity than the refrigeration system.