REFRIGERATION AND AIR CONDITIONING

COURSE CODE: 543-ME-3

LECTURE 2
AIR CONDITIONING 1
➢ Psychrometry Terminology
➢ Air Conditioning Processes
Dr Ahamed Saleel
Mechanical Engineering Department
➢ Human Comfort
College of Engineering
King Khalid University, Abha, KSA
Introduction
Air Conditioning may be defined as the treatment of air so as to simultaneously control its temperature,
moisture content, cleanliness, odour and circulation, as required by occupants, a process, or products in the
space.

 The important steps involved in Air Conditioning are

 Temperature control
 Humidity control
Air filtering, cleaning, and purifying
 Air movement and circulation
 Introduction---continued..
▪ The term vapour implies a gaseous state that is close to the saturation region
of the substance, raising the possibility of condensation during a process.
▪ When we are dealing with a gas–vapour mixture, the vapour may condense
out of the mixture during a process, forming a two-phase mixture.
▪ This may complicate the analysis considerably.
▪ Therefore, a gas–vapour mixture needs to be treated differently from an
ordinary gas mixture.
▪ In practice, the most commonly encountered gas–vapour mixture is the air–
water-vapor mixture (particularly in air conditioning applications).
 Psychrometry Terminology
➢ The psychrometry is the branch of engineering science, which deals with the study of
moist air i.e. dry air mixed with water vapour or humidity.

➢ Though there are many Psychrometric terms, yet the following are important from the
subject point view:

1. Dry air: The pure dry air is a mixture of a number of gases such as nitrogen, oxygen,
carbon dioxide, hydrogen, argon, helium etc. but the nitrogen and oxygen have the major
portion of the combination.
The dry air is considered to have the composition as given in the following table:
Table: Composition of dry air

➢ The molecular mass of dry air is taken as 28.966

➢ and the gas constant of air (Ra) is equal to 0.287 kJ/kg K or 287 J/kg K.
➢ The molecular mass of water vapour is taken as 18.016
➢ and the gas constant for water vapour (Rv) is equal to 0.461 kJ/kg K or 461 J/kg K.
Notes:
(a) The pure dry air does not ordinarily exist in nature because it always contains some water
vapour.
(b) The term air, wherever used, means dry air containing moisture in the vapour form.
(c) Both dry air and water vapour can be considered as perfect gases because both exist in the
atmosphere at low pressure. Thus all the perfect gas terms can be applied to them individually.
(d) The density of dry air is taken as 1.293 kg/m3 at pressure 1.01325 bar or 101325 N/m2 and
temperature 0ºC (273 K).

2.Moist air: it is a mixture of dry air and water vapour. The amount of water vapour depends
upon the absolute pressure and temperature of the mixture.
3. Specific Humidity: It is the mass of water vapour present in a unit mass (1 kg) of dry air,
and generally is expressed in terms of kg per kg of dry air (kg/kg dry air). It is also called
absolute humidity or specific humidity or humidity ratio.
It is denoted by ω :
Gram of water vapour/kg dry air

The atmospheric air can be treated as an ideal-gas mixture whose pressure is the sum of the partial pressure of
dry air Pa and that of water vapour Pv:
4.Saturated air: It is a mixture of dry air and water vapour, when the air contains the maximum
amount of water vapour into it.
➢ The water vapour, usually, occurs in the form of superheated steam as an invisible gas.
➢ However, when the saturated air is cooled, the water vapour in the air starts condensing, and
the same may be visible in the form of moist, fog or condensation on cold surfaces.

The amount of water vapor in saturated air at a specified temperature and pressure can be determined from the following
Equation by replacing Pv by Pg, the saturation pressure of water at that temperature (Refer Fig.)
5. Relative humidity
6. Enthalpy
➢ Atmospheric air is a mixture of dry air and water vapour.
➢ Therefore, the enthalpy of air is expressed in terms of the enthalpies of the dry air and the
water vapour.
➢ In most practical applications, the amount of dry air in the air–water-vapor mixture
remains constant, but the amount of water vapour changes.
➢ Therefore, the enthalpy of atmospheric air is expressed per unit mass of dry air instead of
per unit mass of the air–water vapor mixture.
➢ The total enthalpy (an extensive property) of atmospheric air is the sum of the enthalpies
of dry air and the water vapour.
 the enthalpy and enthalpy change of dry air can be determined from

7. Dry bulb temperature : the ordinary temperature of atmospheric air is frequently referred to
as the dry-bulb temperature to differentiate it from other forms of temperatures.
➢ The dry bulb temperature (briefly written as DBT) is generally denoted by td or tdb.
8. Dew point temperature (DPT)
9. Adiabatic Saturation and Wet-Bulb Temperature (WBT)
➢ Another way of determining the absolute or relative humidity is related to an adiabatic saturation process,
shown schematically and on a T-s diagram in Fig. 14–11.
➢ The system consists of a long insulated channel that contains a pool of water.
➢ A steady stream of unsaturated air that has a specific humidity of ω1 (unknown) and a temperature of T1 is
passed through this channel.
➢ As the air flows over the water, some water evaporates and mixes with the airstream.
➢ The moisture content of air increases during this process, and its temperature decreases, since part of the
latent heat of vaporization of the water that evaporates comes from the air.
➢ If the channel is long enough, the airstream exits as saturated air (ϕ = 100 percent) at temperature T2, which
is called the adiabatic saturation temperature.

Fig: The adiabatic saturation process and

its representation on a T-s diagram of
water.
➢ The adiabatic saturation process discussed above provides a means of determining the absolute or relative humidity of air,
but it requires a long channel or a spray mechanism to achieve saturation conditions at the exit.
➢ A more practical approach is to use a thermometer whose bulb is covered with a cotton wick saturated with water and to
blow air over the wick, as shown in Fig. 14–12.
➢ The temperature measured in this manner is called the wet-bulb temperature Twb, and it is commonly used in air-
conditioning applications.
Sling Psychrometer
➢ The wet-bulb temperature can also be measured by placing the wet-
wicked thermometer in a holder attached to a handle and rotating the
holder rapidly, that is, by moving the thermometer instead of the air.
➢ A device that works on this principle is called a sling psychrometer
and is shown in Fig.
➢ Usually a dry-bulb thermometer is also mounted on the frame of this
device so that both the wet- and dry-bulb temperatures can be read
simultaneously.
➢ Advances in electronics made it possible to measure humidity directly
in a fast and reliable way. It appears that sling psychrometers and wet-
wicked thermometers are about to become things of the past.
➢ Today, hand-held electronic humidity measurement devices based
on the capacitance change in a thin polymer film as it absorbs
water vapor are capable of sensing and digitally displaying the
relative humidity within 1 percent accuracy in a matter of seconds.
Temperature-Humidity data logger
10. Dew point depression
It is the difference between the dry bulb temperature and dew point temperature of air.

11. Wet bulb depression

It is the difference between the dry bulb temperature and wet bulb temperature at any point.
The wet bulb temperature indicates relative humidity of air.
Psychrometric Chart
Psychrometric chart has a number of details, yet the following
lines are important from subject point of view:
1) Dry bulb temperature lines
2) Humidity ratio (specific humidity)
3) Dew point temperature lines
4) Wet bulb temperature lines
5) Enthalpy lines
6) Specific volume lines
7) Relative humidity lines
 Air-Conditioning Processes

➢ Maintaining a living space or an industrial facility at the desired temperature and humidity
requires some processes called air-conditioning processes.
➢ These processes include
✓ simple heating (raising the temperature),
✓ simple cooling (lowering the temperature),
✓ humidifying (adding moisture),
✓ and dehumidifying (removing moisture).
➢ Sometimes two or more of these processes are needed to bring the air to a desired
temperature and humidity level.
➢ Air is commonly heated and humidified in winter and cooled and dehumidified in summer.
Air-conditioning processes
1) Simple heating and cooling
2) Heating with humidification
3) Cooling with dehumidification
4) Evaporative cooling
5) Adiabatic mixing of airstreams
6) Wet cooling towers
 HUMAN COMFORT AND AIR-CONDITIONING
➢ The human body may be assumed as a heat engine whose energy input is food.
➢ As with any other heat engine, the human body generates waste heat that must be rejected
to the environment if the body is to continue operating.
➢ The human body has to maintain its temperature constant
➢ The rate of heat rejection mainly depends on the temperature difference between human
body and the environment.
➢ In cold climate, as the above said temperature difference increases, more heat tends to be
transferred from human body to feel discomfortable.
➢ In hot climate, as the above said temperature difference decreases, heat transfer from the
human body is decelerated to feel discomfortable.
The comfort of the human body depends primarily on three factors:
the (dry-bulb) temperature, relative humidity, and air motion (Figure).
Other factors that affect comfort are air cleanliness, odor, noise, and radiation
effect.

Figure. A comfortable environment.

 Simple Heating (specific humidity is constant) or Sensible Heating

➢ Specific humidity remains constant

➢ The relative humidity of air decreases.
➢ This is because the relative humidity is the ratio of
the moisture content to the moisture capacity of air
at the same temperature, and moisture capacity
increases with temperature.
➢ Therefore, the relative humidity of heated air may
be well below comfortable levels, causing dry skin,
respiratory difficulties, and an increase in static
electricity.
Efficiency of Heating Coil: The term (1-BPF) is known as efficiency of heating coil or contact factor
 Simple Cooling (specific humidity is constant) or Sensible Cooling

➢ Specific humidity remains constant

➢ The relative humidity of air increases.
➢ This is because the relative humidity is the ratio of
the moisture content to the moisture capacity of air
at the same temperature, and moisture capacity
decreases with temperature.
➢ Therefore, the relative humidity of cooled air may
be well above comfortable levels, causing itching
skin, respiratory difficulties, and an increase in
static electricity.
Efficiency of Cooling Coil: The term (1-BPF) is known as efficiency of cooling coil or contact factor
Heating with Humidification

Figure. Heating with humidification.

Cooling with Dehumidification

Figure. Cooling and Dehumidification.

Thank You