Hydrogen, helium and thermo-acoustic refrigerators

In this work the design and analysis of 1 kW thermo-acoustic refrigerators with hydrogen and helium for the temperature difference of 38 K is discussed. Helium is the best for thermoacoustic refrigerators compared to the other competent gases. But hydrogen is chosen since it is less expensive and better thermophysical properties compared to helium. The best parallel plates geometry with 15% blockage is chosen for the stack and heat exchangers. The effect of resonance frequency of hydrogen and helium varying from 400-600 Hz on the theoretical performance is discussed. The coefficient of performance and the power density of 1.65 and 40.3 kW/m3 for hydrogen, and 1.58 and 19.2 kW/m3 for helium is reported for the optimized designs, respectively. The theoretical results are compared with the DeltaEC software results, shows the cooling power and coefficient of performance of 590 W and 1.11 for hydrogen, and 687 W and 1.25 for helium, respectively.