Novel MOF-303/G coated wire-finned heat exchanger for dehumidification applications–Experimental investigation

Adsorption dehumidification outperforms other technologies regarding moisture removal rate, lower energy consumption, and environmental friendliness. The selection of desiccant material, the heat exchanger used, and the method of regeneration significantly impact the performance of desiccant dehumidifiers in terms of water vapour removal rate and energy consumption. Metal-organic framework materials are a new class of microporous materials with high water adsorption characteristics compared to conventional desiccants like silica gel. In this work, a novel MOF-coated electrically heated wire finned heat exchanger was developed, and its performance was experimentally investigated. Wire-finned tubes coated with MOF-303/G outperformed other wire-finned tubes coated with Aluminium fumarate, MIL-100(Fe), MIL-100(Fe)/G, MOF-801 and MOF-801/G, achieving water uptake of 22 %. Also, the addition of graphene nanoplatelets during the synthesis of MOF-303 resulted in a significant enhancement of its thermal diffusivity to reach 0.184–0.23 mm2/s at temperatures ranging between 25 °C and 115 °C. The Coefficient of Performance (COP) for the developed multi-tube MOF-303/G coated heat exchanger was experimentally tested and compared to other desiccant-coated heat exchangers. Results showed that COP values ranging from 0.6264 to 1.02 to 1.2 at the regeneration temperatures of 45 °C, 60 °C and 70 °C, respectively, were achieved, which are higher than those reported in the literature.