Energy, Exergy, and Exergoenvironmental Assessments of Solar-Assisted Absorption Cooling Systems and Conventional Air-Conditioning System: A Comparative Study

Abstract The current study presents a comparative energy, exergy, and exergoenvironmental assessment of four integrated systems. The systems considered are (1) an integrated solar heliostat, single-effect LiBr–water absorption system (System 1), (2) an integrated solar heliostat, double-effect LiBr–water absorption system (System 2), (3) an integrated solar heliostat, triple-effect LiBr–water absorption system (System 3), and (4) a combined combustion–Rankin cycle, conventional air-conditioning system (System 4). Several operating parameters such as ambient and evaporator temperature were varied to observe their effects on the performance of the systems. The analyses showed that the energy and exergy coefficient of performance (COP) for System 3 was the highest (1.511 and 0.2701, respectively), followed by System 4 (1.358 and 0.4435, respectively), System 2 (1.284 and 0.2229, respectively), and System 1 (0.5509 and 0.119, respectively). The highest exergy destruction rate was obtained for System 4, followed by Systems 3, 2, and 1. The comparative analysis showed that although System 4 had the second-best energy and exergy COP, it performed worst in terms of the environment owing to the use of fossil fuels, as opposed to solar energy employed by the absorption cooling systems.