Experimental study of the effect of mechanical vibration on the water solidification rate in ice-on-coil energy storage system

Various solutions have been suggested to overcome the issue when cooling peak hours and electric energy consumption coincide. One of the solutions is to store the cooling load at off-peak hours. One of the most conventional types of storage systems is the ice-on-coil storage system. The low heat transfer rate in this system is one of the challenges. Since the conduction heat transfer coefficient of ice is low, by starting the ice formation, the heat transfer between the refrigerant inside the coil and the reservoir’s water will reduce. One idea to increase the heat transfer rate is to postpone the starting time of the freezing process to keep active the natural convection mechanism. In the present study, mechanical vibration has been used to linger freezing initiation in ice-on-coil energy storage system. The effect of longitudinal and lateral positioning of the probe, on the amount of temperature and initiation time of freezing as well as the amount and structure of formed ice has been investigated. The results revealed that placing the vibrator at the middle of coil over its two ends leads to further increase in the amount of formed ice. It is found that applying mechanical vibration can postpone the initiation time of the freezing process and decrease the subcooling temperature. Moreover, it is shown that the amount of ice formation is a function of subcooling temperature and initiation time of freezing. Finally, the energy consumption of the vibrator and the energy consumption reduction in peak-hour are calculated.