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Active Humidity Control Through Gas-Fired Desiccant Humidity Pump
Abstract
High equipment first cost and high operating costs,
if electricity is used to drive such a system, have prohibited
the application of active humidity control equipment
in comfort conditioning in the past. Instead, passive
techniques have been applied. A comparison of passive
capacity control methods to control humidity shows that only the combined face and bypass and variable air volume
system shows improved performance with respect to space
humidity control, dew point depression, and response to
perturbations.
A gas-fired desiccant humidity pump will provide economical humidity control in existing and new construction
using VAV or constant volume air distribution systems.
The humidity pump is designed as a packaged
make-up air module. It is coupled to new or existing
conventional air-conditioning system via a duct. It
consists of a triple integrated heat-exchanger combining (liquid) desiccant dehumidification with indirect evaporative
cooling, a brine interchanger, and a gas-fired brine
heater to regenerate the desiccant. Field experiments of
two humidity pumps on existing commercial buildings have
been initiated. Each system dehumidifies 5000 scfm of
make-up air to meet all the latent loads, which is then
fed to conventional, electric-driven HVAC equipment
which meet all the sensible loads.
Citation
Novosel, D.; Griffiths, W. C. (1988). Active Humidity Control Through Gas-Fired Desiccant Humidity Pump. Energy Systems Laboratory (http://esl.tamu.edu); Texas A&M University (http://www.tamu.edu). Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /6527.