Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Applied Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy

Computer simulation with TRNSYS for a mobile refrigeration system

incorporating a phase change thermal storage unit
Ming Liu , Wasim Saman, Frank Bruno
Barbara Hardy Institute, University of South Australia, Mawson Lakes, SA 5095, Australia

h i g h l i g h t s
 A mobile refrigeration system incorporating phase change thermal storage was simulated using TRNSYS.
 A TRNSYS component of a phase change thermal storage unit was created and linked to other components from TRNSYS library.
 The temperature in the refrigerated space can be predicted using this TRNSYS model under various conditions.
 A mobile refrigeration system incorporating PCM and an off-peak electric driven refrigeration unit is feasible.
 The phase change material with the lowest melting temperature should be selected.

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 15 November 2013
Received in revised form 18 June 2014
Accepted 28 June 2014
Available online 26 July 2014
Keywords:
Phase change material
Thermal energy storage
Refrigerated transport
Refrigeration system
TRNSYS

a b s t r a c t
This paper presents a new TRNSYS model of a refrigeration system incorporating phase change material
(PCM) for mobile transport. The PCTSU is charged by an off-vehicle refrigeration unit and the PCM provides cooling when discharging and the cooling released is utilized to cool down the refrigerated space.
The advantage of this refrigeration system compared to a conventional system is that it consumes less
energy and produces signicantly lower greenhouse gas emissions. A refrigeration system for a typical
refrigerated van is modelled and simulations are performed with climatic data from four different locations. The main components of the TRNSYS model are Type 88 (cooling load estimation) and Type 300
(new PCTSU component), accompanied by other additional components. The results show that in order
to maintain the temperature of the products at 18 C for 10 h, a total of 250 kg and 390 kg of PCM
are required for no door opening and 20 door openings during the transportation, respectively. In addition, a parametric study is carried out to evaluate the effects of location, size of the refrigerated space,
number of door openings and melting temperature of the PCM on the thermal performance.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The population growth and consumers continuous demand for
fresh food have contributed to an increasing demand for refrigerated transport. Refrigeration systems are essential for maintaining
the temperature in the refrigerated space at the required level. At
present, the predominant technology in refrigerated road transport
is mechanical vapour compression refrigeration driven by a diesel
engine. The engine can be separated from the main traction engine
and usually drives the compressor by a V-belt. However, this type
of engine is relatively expensive, noisy and its efciency is only 35
40% [1]. Also, it generates signicant greenhouse gas (GHG)
emissions. Due to these disadvantages, refrigerated vehicles that

Corresponding author. Tel.: +61 (08) 83025132; fax: +61 (08) 83023380.
E-mail address: ming.liu@unisa.edu.au (M. Liu).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2014.06.066
0306-2619/ 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

use diesel engines to power the refrigeration system are

confronted with some restrictions, especially during deliveries in
large cities.
Research has been carried out to study the problems of refrigeration systems and investigate the techniques to improve their
energy efciency. Buzelin et al. [2] modied a conventional refrigeration system by including a frequency inverter and a closed-loop
power-law control system and achieved an average efciency gain
of 36.4% compared to the traditional onoff control. Bahaj [3] monitored a solar powered transport refrigeration system. The photovoltaic panels mounted on the roof of the vehicle were used to
charge batteries that powered a refrigeration system and the monitored data indicated this system is practical. An absorption refrigeration cycle powered by waste heat from the vehicle engine was
proposed by Garrabrant [4]. He proved the concept by testing a
diesel engine exhaust gas heat exchanger and a hydronically
heated ammonia generator.

M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

227

Nomenclature
A
Df
Fm
gc
h
H
q

door area (m2)

doorway ow factor
1:5
density factor 2=1 qr =qi 1=3 
conversion factor (=1 in SI units)
enthalpy (kJ/kg)
door height (kJ/m3)
cooling load (kW)

The authors proposed a refrigeration system powered by electricity incorporating phase change material (PCM) [5]. A PCM is a
substance with a high heat of fusion which, melting and solidifying
at a certain temperature, is capable of storing or releasing a large
amount of energy per unit mass. Various studies [68] have given
detailed illustrations about the PCMs classication, characteristics,
limitations, measurement techniques and applications. The PCMs
have been applied into numerous applications including solar
heating systems [9,10], conventional air conditioning systems
[11,12], solar electricity generation systems [13,14] and freezer
cold storage systems [1517]. The applications of PCMs for thermally buffering vehicle systems in the operating temperature
range from sub-ambient to 800 C has been reviewed by Jankowski
and McCluskey [18]. Previous results indicated that there is the
potential that the GHG emissions can be signicantly reduced
and the overall energy efciency of the vehicle can be dramatically
improved by properly selecting the PCM in the buffering systems
[18].
With the system proposed by the authors [5], the PCM can be
charged during the night time using a stationary electric powered
refrigeration unit and the stored energy in the PCM can be used to
supply cooling to the refrigerated space when the vehicle is on the
road. In comparison to conventional refrigeration systems, the new
system is expected to have a lower noise level, reduced energy cost
and much lower local GHG emissions. Moreover, because of the
buffer effect of PCM, the temperature uctuations can be prevented. It is well known that the temperature uctuations could
lower the quality of the food during storage and transportation
[19,20]. In stationary operation, the electrically driven refrigeration
units are highly efcient, extremely quiet and highly reliable [5].
The paper by Liu et al. [5] is the rst by the authors that proposed the mobile refrigeration system with PCM for transport
and it presented preliminary experimental results of a potential
PCM contained in plates. That paper also gives details of a TRNSYS
model that was developed for a refrigerated space only to estimate
the instantaneous and the daily refrigeration load for a refrigerated
space with dimensions of 4.2 m  2.4 m  2.2 m. This enabled the
energy cost between the conventional and the proposed refrigeration system to be compared. The results showed that the proposed
system using PCM consumes up to 86.4% less energy than conventional systems [5].
This paper gives details of a computer model that was developed for the mobile refrigeration system incorporating a phase
change thermal storage unit (PCTSU) using TRNSYS 16. This
required a new TRNSYS component to be created to model the
thermal performance of the PCTSU as one did not exist in the TRNSYS library. To the authors knowledge, it is the rst time that TRNSYS was used for modelling a mobile transport with cooling
supplied by a PCTSU. The model is capable of predicting the temperature in the refrigerated space for various climatic data, phase
change materials and associated plumbing equipment and also

Greek symbols

effectiveness of doorway protective devices
q
density (kg/m3)
Subscripts
i
inltration air
r
refrigerated air
lnt
latent
melt
melting temperature

when there is inltration through the door opening. Simulations

were carried out using this model and a parametric study was conducted to determine the thermal performance under various
conditions.
2. Description of the refrigeration system
The conguration of the refrigeration system is presented in
Fig. 1. The refrigeration system consists of an on-vehicle PCTSU, an
off-vehicle refrigeration unit, a cooling unit in the refrigerated space,
a fan, pumps and a controller. A PCM developed by Liu et al. [5] is utilized in the PCTSU to maintain the refrigerated space at a temperature of 18 C. The PCM developed has a melting temperature of
26.7 C and a latent heat of fusion of 154 kJ/kg. Generally, frozen
meat and shery products are required to be delivered at 18 C
to minimize quality loss during transportation [21]. The size of the
refrigerated space under investigation is 3 m  2 m  1.8 m and
the wall is insulated with 50 mm polyurethane.
The PCM is encapsulated into thin at containers, which are
parallel stacked with heat transfer uid (HTF) owing along the
passages in between, which are all contained in a well-insulated
case (Fig. 2). A at plate PCTSU is selected due to its simple construction and high ratio of surface area to volume. The PCTSU is
located outside of the refrigerated space. It is connected to a fan
coil unit inside the refrigerated space by HTF-circulating pipes.
The PCTSU can be charged by a refrigeration unit when the vehicle
is stationary in the warehouse or depot, during which the liquid
PCM is solidied to a temperature below the melting temperature
of the PCM and thus the cooling energy is stored in the PCTSU. The
refrigeration unit is powered by electricity instead of an internal
combustion engine and it is located in the warehouse instead of
on the vehicle. In stationary operation, the electrically driven
refrigeration units are highly efcient, extremely quiet and highly
reliable. Also, the refrigeration units operate more efciently during the night time [22]. The PCTSU can discharge the stored cooling
capacity when it is on the road. The PCM when melting will release
the cooling energy to the HTF, which then exchanges heat with air
in the cooling unit. A controller is utilized to maintain the temperature of the refrigerated space at the desired level.

3. System model
The refrigeration system was modelled using the TRNSYS program (version 16), which is a transient simulation package developed by the Solar Energy Laboratory, University of Wisconsin and
it is written in ANSII standard Fortran-77. Its use has been popular
in simulating solar water heating systems [2325]. The mathematical models of many components have been programmed and
stored as subroutines in the TRNSYS library. TRNSYS is capable of
connecting system components in any desired manner to construct

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M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Fig. 1. Conguration of the refrigeration system.

was used to simulate the cooling load in the refrigerated space. It

neglects solar gains and assumes an overall heat transfer coefcient value for the entire structure. The cooling load consists of
the following components:

Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of the PCTSU showing the PCM containers and
circulating uid channels.

a systems model. Therefore, the entire problem of system simulation reduces to a problem of identifying all the components that
comprise the particular system [23]. Once all the components of
the system have been identied, it is necessary to construct an
information ow diagram. In the diagram, each component is represented as a box that requires a number of constant parameters
and time-dependent inputs and produces a set of time-dependent
outputs. An output may be used as an input to any number of other
components, including itself. The information ow diagram of the
refrigeration system integrated with a PCTSU is shown in Fig. 3.
Only the discharge process when the truck is on the road was modelled as the temperature in the refrigerated space and the operation time of the refrigerated truck are the two critical factors for
this application. The charging process is expected to be accomplished in 8 h during the off peak electricity tariff period
(11:00 pm7:00 am). This can be done by adjusting the capacity
of the refrigeration unit and the ow rate of the pump. It is
assumed that the PCM temperature is 36 C at the end of the
charging process.
The main components of the model are the PCTSU and the
refrigerated space. A one dimensional numerical model of a at
plate PCTSU, which was developed and validated by Liu et al.
[26], was written in FORTRAN and linked for use with TRNSYS 16
by lling the codes into a standard TRNSYS template. As a result,
a new component, namely Type 300, was created to simulate the
thermal behaviour of the PCTSU. This Type 300 component has
been validated by experimental results [26].
In the work presented here, the Type 300 component has been
linked to other components to develop a model of a complete system. The HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU and the heat
transfer rate are two main outputs from this component. The
Type 88 building model, which is capable of modelling a simple
lumped capacitance single zone structure subject to internal gains,

i. Transmission load through roof, oor and walls. This was estimated by considering the conduction and convection heat
losses through the refrigerated truck body. The solar radiation effect on the exposed surfaces was considered by adding the values given in the ASHARE Handbook [21] to the
temperature difference for walls of different orientations.
The Adelaide climate data was obtained from the Australian
Climate Data Bank (ACDB) [27]. The orientation of each wall
of the refrigerated space is required to describe the cold
space as this affects the value of the heat load. However, this
is uncertain in real operation. Therefore, the refrigerated van
facing north, south, east and west was modelled and the one
with the maximum cooling load was selected in the system
performance analysis and parametric analysis.
ii. Equipment related load. The heat gain dissipated in the refrigerated space from the fan motor and defrost equipment have
to be taken into consideration. Equipment heat gain is usually small at refrigerated temperatures above approximately
1 C; however, it may increase to 15% of the total load at a
space temperature of 30 C [21]. It is assumed that the fan
is driven by a 120 W motor inside the refrigerated space and
the heat dissipated from the electric motor is 117 W (from
Table 6, chapter 13 in [20]). Also, the energy transferred
from the pump motor to the HTF is included.
iii. Product load. The heat gains from the product are (1) heat
required to be removed to bring products to the storage temperature and (2) heat generated by products in storage [21].
The frozen meat enters the conditioned space at a temperature of 18 C so that no heat needs to be removed from it.
Also, there is no respiration heat released by the frozen meat
during transportation. Therefore, the product load for this
application is zero.
iv. Inltration air load through doorway. There is a 2 m  1.8 m
door at the back of the truck. Perfect door sealing was
assumed and no inltration takes place when the door is
closed. When the door is open, inltration occurs because
of the air density differences between the refrigerated space
and the ambient air. Inltration load and the associated
equipment loads can account for more than half of the total
cooling load of distribution warehouses and similar applications [21]. An air exchange equation (Eq. (1)) developed by
Gosney and Olama [28] is employed to estimate the inltration heat gain for fully established ow.



q 0:5
qinf 0:221Ahi  hr qr 1  i
g c H0:5 F m

qr

M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

229

Fig. 3. TRNSYS information ow diagram for the refrigeration system.

The enthalpy and density of the air vary with temperature. As a

result, the inltration load through the doorway varies. To simplify
the calculation of inltration load during hot days, the design summer outdoor ambient conditions in Adelaide was used instead of
the transient climatic data. The design outside ambient conditions
are 36 C dry bulb and 21 C wet bulb and the design storage conditions are 18 C dry bulb and 85% relative humidity. The heat
gain qinf is calculated to be 142.25 kW.
The inltration heat gain through the doorway can be estimated
by Eq. (2). The doorway ow factor, Df, is the ratio of actual air
exchange to fully established ow. It is 1.0 when an unused doorway stands open to a large room or to the outdoors, and where cold
outow is not obstructed [21]. Based on the research by Hendrix
et al. [29] and Downing and Meffert [30], ASHRAE [21] recommends a value of 0.8 for temperature differentials great than
11 C.  is the effectiveness values of doorway protective devices.
The door with air curtains has an effectiveness ranging from very
poor to more than 0.7 [21]. For the purpose of this application,
0.7 is assumed. Based on the assumptions made, the instantaneous
inltration load through the doorway is 34 kW.

qi qinf Df 1  

Additional TRNSYS components in the model include: Type 109

combined data reader and solar radiation processor, Type 33c psychometrics, Type 23 PID controller, Type 508a cooling coil, Type
111b variable speed fan, Type 110 variable speed pump, Type 24
integrator, Type 25 printer, Type 65 online plotter and Type 28
simulation summary.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Simulation results
4.1.1. Transmission load through refrigerated body
As the shape of the refrigerated space is symmetrical, the truck
facing north and east were simulated to estimate the heat gain of
the refrigerated truck operated from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm under a

typical Adelaide climate data from ACDB, which is shown in

Fig. 4. Adelaide has a mild Mediterranean climate. The simulation
was carried out on an hourly basis and then the result was summarized into days since the maximum daily load determines the
amount of storage material required. The daily heat gain proles
present similar trends with the truck facing north and east and
the north facing requires slightly more cooling than east facing.
The case of the truck facing north was utilized in the following simulation and the minimum and maximum daily loads are 9.7 MJ and
23.0 MJ, occurring on the 25th of June and 14th of February,
respectively.
4.1.2. Comparison of Type 56 and Type 88 on transmission load
estimation
Another component in the TRNSYS library to simulate the thermal behaviour of the refrigerated space is the Type 56. It is a thorough multi-zone building model. The heat conduction at the
internal and external wall surfaces is calculated using time series
equations and they are evaluated at equal time intervals. The truck
motion is allowed for through the outside surface heat transfer
coefcient. More accurate results should be obtained by using Type
56 than using Type 88.
The daily transmission cooling loads obtained from both Type
56 and Type 88 are compared and the results are shown in Fig. 5,
also, the difference between them is presented in the gure. It is
observed that those two proles are quite similar. Generally, the
daily load generated by using Type 88 is slightly higher than that
by Type 56 in the period from April to September and lower from
October to March. The difference between the load of the refrigerated space modelled by Type 56 and that modelled by Type 88 is
within 10%. It reveals that Type 88 provides sufcient accuracy
for estimating the daily cooling load for a single zone. The estimated total yearly transmission cooling loads are 5195 MJ and
5224 MJ respectively by using Type 88 and Type 56 respectively.
The advantage of Type 88 over Type 56 is that the speed of simulating a system is much quicker and Type 88 allows for a smaller
simulation time step.

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M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Fig. 4. Daily transmission load through the refrigerated body when the truck is facing north and east.

Fig. 5. Daily transmission cooling load gained in the refrigerated space from Type 56 and Type 88 and their difference (truck facing north and Adelaide climate data from
ACDB).

4.1.3. Maximum load without door opening during transportation

The maximum daily transmission load is 23.0 MJ. It is assumed
that the rated power of both the fan and the pump is 200 W. Considering the heat gain dissipated in the refrigerated space from the
fan (184 W) and the heat gain in the HTF pumping (64 W) and adding a 20% safety factor, a total of 250 kg PCM is required to supply
the cooling for the desired van. It needs 12 PCM slabs with dimensions of each slab of 1.6 m  0.52 m  0.02 m, which can be
altered. However, the heat transfer rate is not affected by the
choice of the length and the width of the slab while the thickness
and the surface area are kept constant [31]. To avoid food spoilage
during delivery, the circulation rate of the conditioned air should
be sufcient to surround the refrigerated space. The circulation
rate of the fan is dependent on the volume of the refrigerated
space. For the size of the space under investigation, an evaporator
fan is assumed to have a ow rate of 1500 kg/h based on a commercial mobile refrigeration system [32]. A variable speed pump
is utilized to circulate the HTF between the PCTSU and the cooling
coil so cooling can be provided. A PID controller is employed to
adjust the ow rate of the pump to maintain the refrigerated space
at a temperature of 18 0.5 C. The rated mass ow rate of the
pump is 120 kg/h in the simulation.
The initial temperatures of the refrigerated space and the PCM
are 25 C and 36 C respectively. The simulation starts from
8:00 am and ends at 9:00 pm on the 14th of February until all
the cooling energy stored in the PCM has been released. Fig. 6 presents the ambient temperature, refrigerated space temperature,
HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU, pump ow rate fraction
and PCTSU heat transfer rate. In the rst hour, the refrigerated
space is cooled from 25 C to 18 C, during which period, the ow
rate of the pump is kept at its maximum. Then the pump speed is
varied to keep the space temperature at 18 C approximately
between 9:00 am and 19:00 pm (10 h). The temperature starts to
increase when all the latent heat stored in the PCM has been

released. The simulation result indicates the developed refrigeration system with a PCTSU can satisfy the designed operation conditions. The energy supplied by the PCTSU is capable of
compensating the cooling load of the refrigerated space and the
heat dissipated by the pump and fan.
4.1.4. Minimum load without door opening during transportation
When operating the van on a day other than the maximum load
day, the operation time of the refrigeration system can be greater
than 10 h if the PCTSU is fully charged. The operation time is
dened as the period of time that the refrigeration system is capable of maintaining the space at a temperature of 18 0.5 C. A
simulation was carried out, with the same PCTSU in Section 4.1.2
and operated at the minimum cooling load day, to estimate the
longest operation time of this refrigeration system. The ambient
temperature, refrigerated space temperature, HTF temperature
exiting from the PCTSU, pump ow rate fraction and PCTSU heat
transfer rate are shown in Fig. 7. The operation time of the refrigeration system is 19.6 h, which is almost double the operation time
on the maximum load day. During most of the time, the pump runs
at half of its rated ow rate. The average cooling load is 518 W
including 270 W transmission load and 184 W and 64 W energy
losses by the fan and pump respectively, which is supplied by
the PCTSU.
4.1.5. Maximum load with 20 door openings during transportation
The simulation was also executed for a refrigerated van operated with 20 door openings with an interval of 30 min to assume
frequent delivery. It is assumed that each door opening takes
36 s including 6 s for door open-close time and 30 s for door stand
open time. The inltration load through the doorway is estimated
to be 24.5 MJ and the total cooling load on the maximum load day
is estimated to be 56.5 MJ. Thus, a total of 390 kg PCM is required
to store the required amount of energy. As a result, the

M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

231

Fig. 6. Ambient temperature, refrigerated space temperature and HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU during the refrigerated truck operated on the maximum cooling
load day.

Fig. 7. Ambient temperature, refrigerated space temperature and HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU during the refrigerated truck operated on the minimum cooling
load day.

arrangement of the PCM containers is 18 parallel PCM slabs with

dimensions of 1.6 m  0.52 m  0.02 m and the gap between each
two adjacent slabs are 4 mm. The ambient temperature, refrigerated space temperature, HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU,
pump ow rate fraction and PCTSU heat transfer rate are shown in
Fig. 8. When the door is opened, the temperature of the refrigerated space increases by approximately 8 C. To cool down the space
to the desired temperature, the ow rate of the pump will be
increased and thus the cooling energy supplied by the PCTSU will
be increased and the refrigerated space temperature will decrease.
The time for the space to recover and reach 18 C is about 30 min
after each door opening.
4.1.6. System performance evaluation without door opening
The operation of the refrigerated van without door opening was
simulated for a whole year with the Adelaide climate data. The

parameters and inputs for the TRNSYS components are the same
as those in Section 4.1.2. The operation times of the refrigerated
van uctuate greatly between a minimum of 10.2 h on the 14th
of February and a maximum of 19.6 h on the 25th of June, which
are shown in Fig. 9. Generally, the operation time is over 10 h
between November and February, 12 h in March and October,
14 h in April and September and 16 h between May and August,
which is indicated by the dot line in Fig. 9.
4.2. Parametric study
4.2.1. Effect of climate
The daily transmission cooling loads of three other cities in Australia were simulated and compared with that of Adelaide in
Fig. 10. Brisbane has a humid subtropical climate, Melbourne has
a moderate oceanic climate and Sydney has a temperate climate

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M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Fig. 8. Ambient temperature, refrigerated space temperature and HTF temperature exiting from the PCTSU during the refrigerated truck operated on the maximum cooling
load day with 20 door openings.

Fig. 9. Operation times of the refrigeration system in a typical Adelaide climate condition.

Fig. 10. Daily transmission cooling loads in the refrigerated space for 4 cities in Australia Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney.

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M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Table 1
Maximum and minimum daily transmission cooling loads in the refrigerated space for four capital cities.
Adelaide

Maximum
Minimum

Brisbane

Melbourne

Sydney

Date

Value (MJ)

Date

Value (MJ)

Date

Value (MJ)

Date

Value (MJ)

February 14th
June 25th

23.0
9.8

January 26th
August 8th

19.5
11.7

January 8th
July 12th

20.1
9.9

February 14th
July 12th

20.8
10.8

Fig. 11. Operation times of the refrigeration system in a typical Melbourne climate condition.

Table 2
Calculation on the amount of PCM required (PCM latent heat = 154 kJ/kg) for various sizes of refrigerated transport.

Size of the refrigerated space

Door size
Inltration load during 1 door opening (30 s) (kJ)
Fan power (W)
Heat dissipated by fan (W)
Pump power (W)
Heat dissipated by pump (W)
Total cooling energy required including heat loss through PCTSU (MJ)

Amount of PCM required (kg)

No door
10 Door
20 Door
No door
10 Door
20 Door

with warm summers and mild winters. The climate data are all
from ACDB. Melbourne has the lowest daily transmission cooling
load throughout the year. From April to September, Brisbane has
the highest daily transmission cooling load, followed by Sydney
and Adelaide. For other months, Adelaide, Brisbane and Sydney
have similar transmission cooling loads. Furthermore, the Adelaide
cooling load prole has the greatest uctuation and Brisbane has
the smallest. Table 1 lists the maximum and minimum daily transmission cooling loads evaluated for Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne
and Sydney. Adelaide has the highest maximum daily cooling load.
Therefore, the refrigerated truck designed for Adelaide can satisfy
the requirement for at least 10 h of operation time in the other
three cities.
Based on the same amount of PCM and the arrangement of the
PCM slabs, the operation time was simulated for Melbourne climate conditions, which is shown in Fig. 11. It was found that the
average operation time in Melbourne is longer than that in Adelaide. It varies between a minimum of 10.3 h on the 8th of January
and a maximum of 19.6 h on the 12th of July. Generally, the operation time is over 10 h in January, 12 h in February and December,
14 h in March, April, October and November, 16 h between May
and September, which is indicated by the dot line in Fig. 11.
4.2.2. Effect of size of refrigerated vehicle and number of door openings
The cooling load of three different sizes of refrigerated vehicle
was obtained using TRNSYS. The sizes of the refrigerated space

opening
openings
openings
opening
openings
openings

Type I

Type II

Type III

3 m  2 m  1.8 m
2 m  1.8 m
1024
200
184
200
64
35
46
57
280
350
420

4.2 m  2.4 m  2.2 m

2.4 m  2.2 m
1660
300
252
300
72
55
73
90
360
470
590

10 m  2.4 m  2.6 m
2.4 m  2.6 m
2133
500
420
500
120
118
140
163
770
910
1060

Fig. 12. Amount of PCM required versus number of door openings for three types of
refrigerated vehicles (PCMs are assumed to have latent heats of 154 and 200 kJ/kg).

under investigation are: 3 m  2 m  1.8 m (Type I: van),

4 m  2.4 m  2.2 m (Type II: truck) and 10 m  2.4 m  2.6 m
(Type III: trailer) respectively. The effect of the number of door
openings during the operation time from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm
was also investigated. The maximum daily transmission cooling

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M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

Fig. 13. Simulated zone temperature, heat transfer rate and pump mass ow rate during the 17 h operation from 8:00 am on 14th of February with the PCM melting
temperatures of 26.7, 29 and 32 C.

loads and maximum instantaneous transmission cooling loads to

keep the space temperature at 18 C are 23 MJ and 720 W (Type
I), 39 MJ and 1200 W (Type II) and 90 MJ and 2776 W (Type III)
respectively.
The total cooling energy required for maintaining the specied
conditions and the amount of PCM needed were estimated according to various sizes of refrigerated vehicles and different numbers
of door openings. The results are presented in Table 2. The latent
heat of the PCM used in the calculation is 154 kJ/kg. Furthermore,
when calculating the heat loss through the PCTSU, the temperature
inside the PCTSU is at the melting temperature and the daily average temperature in the maximum cooling load day (37 C) is used
as the ambient temperature. The PCTSU is insulated by 50 mm
polyurethane.
Some of the commercial PCMs have a latent heat of fusion over
200 kJ/kg [33]. The amount of PCM required will be greatly reduced
if those PCMs are used. Fig. 12 compares the amount of PCM
required versus number of door openings for various sizes of
refrigerated vehicles for PCMs having latent heats of fusion of
154 and 200 kJ/kg, respectively.
4.2.3. Effect of melting temperature of the PCM
The model was run from 8:00 am on 14th of February to
1:00 am on 15th of February with the PCM melting temperatures
of 26.7, 29 and 32 C, respectively. The sensible cooling energy
below the melting temperature is neglected by setting the PCM initial temperature to 0.3 C below the melting temperature. The initial temperature of the refrigerated space is 17 C. The other
parameters are the same as those in Section 4.1.2. The predicted
refrigerated zone temperature, heat transfer rate in the PCTSU
and pump mass ow rate are presented in Fig. 13.
To provide the same cooling energy to the refrigerated van, the
ow rate of the pump is varied between 0 and 13.5 h. It is found
that the lower the melting temperature of the storage material,
the lower the ow rate (speed) of the pump, which will result in
low pressure drop and reduced energy consumption. If the door
is opened and the temperature drops, the pump speed will be
altered to maximum. Then the PCM with the lowest melting temperature is capable of supplying the maximum heat transfer rate,
which helps to cool down the space quickly. Therefore, the PCM
with lower melting temperature should be selected.

5. Conclusion
In this paper, the transient cooling load in a refrigerated space
of a mobile refrigeration system was modelled using TRNSYS 16
and the thermal performance of the refrigeration system incorporating a phase change storage unit was investigated. The following
results can be concluded from the analysis:
 A mobile refrigeration system incorporating PCM and an offpeak electric driven refrigeration unit is feasible, that is, can
maintain a refrigerated space at 18 C for 10 h in the climate
of Adelaide, Australia.
 When the refrigeration system is operated on the vehicle, the
orientation of the vehicle is variable and the cooling load
slightly varies with orientation. The vehicle facing north is used
in the system model as the cooling load is slightly more than
that when the vehicle is facing east. The maximum and minimum daily transmission cooling loads for Adelaide occur on
the 14th of February and 25th of June, respectively. They are
23.0 MJ and 9.7 MJ, respectively.
 Door opening increases the cooling load considerably and the
instantaneous inltration load through the doorway is 34 kW.
Assuming each door opening lasts 36 s, the temperature of the
refrigerated space will increase by approximately 8 C and it
takes half an hour for the refrigeration system to cool down
to the temperature to 18 C. Therefore, the time when the
door is kept open should be kept to a minimum. Also, doorway
protective devices (such as air curtains and fast-fold doors) are
recommended in refrigerated vehicles.
 The amount of PCM required is strongly dependent on the maximum daily cooling load and the latent heat of fusion of the
PCM.
 The PCM with the lowest melting temperature can cool down
the refrigerated space fast if a sudden increase in temperature
occurs and also it requires less pumping power to operate the
refrigeration system. However, more energy is required to
freeze the PCM. Therefore, this needs to be weighed out with
the benets a lower temperature PCM provides.
 The storage unit is designed to satisfy the 10-h operation time
in the maximum cooling load day. Therefore, on other days,
the cooling energy stored is capable of operating for more than

M. Liu et al. / Applied Energy 132 (2014) 226235

10 h if it is fully charged. Even after all the PCM has melted, this
system will warm up gradually using the sensible storage of the
liquid PCM. Furthermore, the maximum daily transmission
cooling loads in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney were estimated and the refrigerated van designed for Adelaide weather
conditions can satisfy the requirement of operation in these
three cities.

Acknowledgments
This work was done collaboratively between the Barbara Hardy
Institute and QuickCool Cooling Technologies. The authors would
like to thank QuickCool Cooling Technologies for supplying the
refrigeration unit and the South Australian Sustainable Energy
Research Advisory Committee for their nancial support.
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