Thermal modelling and coupling of a heat pipe integrated desorber with a Solid Oxide Fuel Cell

Highlights: • Novel heat pipe integrated desorber with each heat pipe transferring 250 W of heat. • Coupling with cathode exhaust from 1 kW SOFC stack. • Direct heat transfer from heat source to desorber. • Modelling of complete process from heat transfer to refrigerant desorption. • Component development for small scale vapour absorption refrigeration systems. -- Abstract: This paper presents a modelling investigation on a novel concept for a desorber where in heat pipes are employed to transfer the required amount of heat to the desorber. Such a design is not only compact but also gives high performance. A complete component level model for integrating the Solid Oxide Fuel Cell and the desorber via the heat pipe network is presented first for a 1 kW cooling load at an evaporation temperature of −20 °C and later generalised design maps are chalked out for other cooling loads. It is found that the desorber operating pressure can be brought down to 10 bar when compared to conventional desorber designs which requires pressures in the range 15–20 bar. Also a complete design of the heat pipe itself for such an application is presented and water was identified as the best working fluid within the heat pipe for such an application.