A Heater-Assisted Air Source Heat Pump Air Conditioner to Improve Thermal Comfort with Frost-Retarded Heating and Heat-Uninterrupted Defrosting

Fei Wang, Rijing Zhao, Wenming Xu, Dong Huang and Zhiguo Qu
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Fei Wang: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 28 Xianning West Road, Xi’an 710049, China
Rijing Zhao: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 28 Xianning West Road, Xi’an 710049, China
Wenming Xu: Qingdao Haier Air Conditioner General Corp., Ltd., Qingdao 266103, China
Dong Huang: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 28 Xianning West Road, Xi’an 710049, China
Zhiguo Qu: School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 28 Xianning West Road, Xi’an 710049, China

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 9, 1-13

Abstract: Frost deposits on the outdoor heat exchanger of an air source heat pump (ASHP) air conditioner and reduces its capacity during winter operation. However, the prevailing reverse-cycle defrosting (RCD) turns the indoor heat exchanger into an evaporator and ceases heat supply to the living space. Consequently, the thermal comfort for indoor occupants is deteriorated. This article proposes a heater-assisted ASHP to tackle this problem. With an 800 W electromagnetic heater equipped upstream of the outdoor heat exchanger to provide refrigerant with additional heat, the ASHP retarded frost under original throttling control and compressor speed during the heating cycle (frostless mode), and even removed frost with uninterrupted heat supply to indoor space under little throttling and reduced compressor speed (anti-frost mode). Compared with the original operation of the ASHP when the heater was off (baseline mode), frostless and anti-frost modes extended heating duration by 17.9% and 99.7%, respectively, with comparative time-averaged supply-air temperature. Moreover, COP for baseline and anti-frost modes was similar by average, about 3% higher than for the frostless mode. Further optimizations will be done on the co-adjustment of throttling control and compressor speed to better fulfill the potential of the heater-assisted ASHP.

Keywords: air-source heat pump; frost retardation; thermal comfort; heat supply (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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