+44-7897-074717Isola AE*, Olakunle MS, Olawale AS
Drying is an energy intensive thermal process. Industrial processes may use heat pumps to recover low grade waste heat and utilize it for drying process. This current study aimed to evaluate the effect of varying air flowrate and thickness of tomato slices on the drying efficiency of the drying process at condensing temperature 15°C and evaporating temperature 10°C using Calcium chloride-ethanol as adsorbate-adsorbent pair. The energetic coefficient of performance, Carnot coefficient of performance for heating and exergetic coefficient of performance are 2.03, 57.60 and 15.6% respectively. For the drying analysis, the specific moisture extraction rate is 0.234 kg/kWhr and specific energy consumption is 4.27 kg/kWhr. The heat pump drying system modeled and simulated at a varied air flowrate and thickness of tomatoes serves as predictive tool to determine the efficiency of the drying process and how to determine the optimum condition. Thus, it can be concluded that as the air flowrate increases or thickness of tomato slices decreases, the drying efficiency also increases.
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