Study on adsorption refrigeration performance of MIL-101-isobutane working pair

• Adsorption isotherms and kinetic of isobutane on MIL-101 were studied.
• A single bed adsorption chiller with MIL-101-isobutane pair was built.
• System performed better than that using activated carbon–isobutane pair.
• Stability of MIL-101 subjected to 500 ad/desorption cycles has been verified.

Rising concerns about pro-environment and energy conservation bring about the escalating interests in adsorption cooling systems using renewable energy. Adsorption chillers with common refrigerants (water, ethanol, methanol, etc.) face the problem that advanced technologies and intricate design considerations are required to maintain high vacuum. This paper aims at the parameters optimization of adsorption system being operated with the novel working pair, MIL-101-isobutane, under typical conditions of ice making and air-condition. Adsorption isotherms and dynamic of isobutane on MIL-101 are discussed simultaneously. When the hot water inlet temperature, cooling water temperature and desorption time are 95 °C, 30 °C and 30 min, respectively, the cooling capacity is 45.7 kJ/kg, which is 1.7 times as much as that of activated carbon–isobutane pair. Structural stability of MIL-101 subjected to 500 times adsorption/desorption cycles has been successfully verified by XRD (X-ray diffraction).