Effect of Internal Heat Recovery in Ammonia-Water Absorption Cooling Cycles: Exergy and Structural Analysis

First and second law analysis have been conducted for three low temperature driven ammonia-water absorption cooling cycles with increasing internal heat recovery. Based on the results of exergy analysis the structural analysis has been achieved. The obtained Coefficients of Structural Bonds (CSB) consider how the irreversibility of the whole cycle is affected by a change in the irreversibility related to an efficiency improvement of a single component. Trends for the different configurations are similar, while quantitative differences among the main heat exchangers are considerable. The highest values of the CSB are found for the refrigerant heat exchanger. Also the evaporator, the condenser, the generator and the absorber show values higher than unity. The lowest CSB's are obtained in the solution heat exchanger. In general, CSB's decrease with increasing efficiency. That means that for very efficient heat exchangers, a further improvement looks less attractive. The dephlegmator is an exception as it shows a singularity of the CSB value due to its complex interactions with the other components. Once the CSB's are obtained for the main components, they can be used in the structural method of the thermoeconomic optimisation. This method enables us to find the optimum design of a component in a straightforward calculation.