INTRODUCTION

Refrigeration is used widely in various applications from industrial to domestic

situations mainly for the storage and transport of perishable foodstuffs and chemical
substances .it has the prime function to remove heat from a low temperature region and it can
also be applied as heat pump for supplying heat to a region of high temperature. A major
application area of thermodynamics is refrigeration, which is the transfer of heat from a lower
temperature medium to a higher temperature medium. The devices that produce refrigeration
are caller refrigerators, and the cycles on that operate is called refrigeration cycles. It is
known that the purpose of refrigeration is to lowered the temperature of a region and also
maintaining the region.

The first use of refrigeration system is in 1756 by William Cullen at the University of
Glasgow in Scotland, and when it widespread use in commercial from 1870 till present.
Refrigeration issued widely in various applications from industrial to domestic situations,
mainly for the storage and transport of perishable foodstuffs and chemical substances. It has
the prime function to remove heat from low temperature region and it can also be applied as a
heat pump for supplying heat to a region of high temperature. Probably the most widely used
current applications of refrigeration are for the air-conditioning of private homes and public
buildings, and the refrigeration of foodstuffs in homes, restaurants and large storage
warehouses. The use of refrigerators in kitchens for the storage of fruits and vegetables has
permitted the addition of fresh salads to the modern diet year round, and to store fish and
meats safely for long periods.

In commerce and manufacturing, there are many uses for refrigeration. Refrigeration
is used to liquify gases like oxygen, nitrogen, propane and methane for example. In
compressed air purification, it is used to condense water vapor from compressed air to reduce
its moisture content. In oil refineries, chemical plants, and petrochemical plants, refrigeration
is used to maintain certain processes at their required low temperatures (for example, in the
alkylation of butenes and butane to produce a high octane gasoline component).
Metalworkers use refrigeration to temper steel and cutlery. In transporting temperature-
sensitive foodstuffs and other materials by trucks, trains, airplanes and sea-going vessels,
refrigeration is a necessity.
 Figure 1 shows different types of the cooling systems. The Coefficient of
Performance (COP) of vapor compression refrigeration is higher than other available
techniques. It should be noted, however, that the absorption technique can also be directly
operated by heat instead of electricity which in certain applications is a benefit for this
technique.

Figure 1: Different cooling systems and their COP ranges.