Performance characterization of a small milk cooling system with ice storage for PV applications
- Publication Type
- Journal contribution (peer reviewed)
- Authors
- Torres-Toledo, Victor; Meissner, Klaus; Coronas, Alberto; Müller, Joachim
- Year of publication
- 2015
- Published in
- International Journal of Refrigeration
- Band/Volume
- 60/
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.Jrefrig.2015.06.025
- Page (from - to)
- 81-91
- Keywords
- ice storage, Milchqualität, milk, milk cooling, performance model, photovoltaic application
The presented work proposes a calculation method to estimate the transient performance of a small on-farm milk cooling system for PV applications. The system employs 3 kg ice for fast cooling of 17 L milk in conventional 20-L-milk-cans. Two units of a commercial DC refrigerator operate at -10°C and at 4°C for ice production and milk preservation respectively. The development of milk temperature and energy consumption during a cooling event was studied experimentally at different ambient temperatures of 20°C, 30°C and 40°C. A computational model was developed and validated where thermal resistances and COP were adjusted with experimental data. The results between 20°C and 40°C ambient temperature show a COP reduction of around 30% and a total daily energy consumption increase of around 100%. The specific total energy consumption of the system per litre milk was between 30 Wh/L and 58 Wh/L for the studied ambient temperature range. The suggested model can be used for the optimization of photovoltaic stand-alone systems at specific locations.