A Review on Desiccant Dehumidification Assisted Air-Conditioning System

In recent years, the demand of electricity increases exponentially over the world due to increase in demand in air-conditioning for building cooling. Vapor compression based conventional air-conditioners consume lot of electricity due to requirement of low evaporation temperature to dehumidified air and post-reheating to meet required design supply conditions. Desiccant based dehumidification and cooling system is one of the novel options in space cooling applications to provide the ameliorated indoor air quality and thermal comfort with the minimum cooling power. The present paper describes a detailed review on use of desiccant cooling systems in the field of comfort space cooling for different Indian regions. Through performance studies of desiccant cooling system, it has proven its feasibility and advantages of energy and cost saving in especially in hot and humid ambient. Thus, desiccant based air-conditioning system could be a better option to other traditional cooling systems such as vapor-compression air conditioning system as well as the evaporative cooling in hot and humid outdoor climatic conditions.