journal article·2020-06-20Open access

Investigation on an Improved Household Refrigerator for Energy Saving of Residential Buildings

Jingyu Cao, Qiliang Wang, Mingke Hu, Xiao Ren, Weixin Liu, Yuehong Su, Gang Pei

Applied Sciences· Volume 10· Issue 12

Abstract

The efficiency improvement of household refrigerators is of significance to electricity consumption reduction of residential buildings. The cold loss recovery in household refrigerators is a promising development direction. In this study, a refrigerator improved by heat pipes is designed to reduce the cold loss at freezer walls to enhance the overall efficiency of the refrigerator. A complete steady-state mathematical model is built for characterizing its overall energy saving behaviors by introducing the real structural parameters of a Midea BCD-111 refrigerator and measured temperature boundary conditions. The performances of the improved refrigerator are investigated with typical operating states, variable ambient temperature, and heat pipe design. The simulative results indicate that the cold loss of the freezer of the improved refrigerator can be reduced by 8.3–16.5%, and the energy saving capability is relatively reliable. Results verify that the cold loss recovery of the improved refrigerator is feasible in various operating conditions.
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Research context

OpenAlex topics: Building Energy and Comfort Optimization · Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Technologies · Heat Transfer and Optimization

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

Affiliations

Department of Thermal Science and Energy Engineering, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, China

Department of Building Services Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China

Department of Architecture and Built Environment, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK

Funding

National Key R&D Program of China · China Postdoctoral Science Foundation · Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities · National Natural Science Foundation of China

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