Novel Humidity Pump using Metal-Organic Frameworks for Indoor Moisture Control

Latent cooling load accounts for 30% of the total load of air-conditioning, and its proportion is even higher in many tropical and subtropical climates. Traditional moisture control technologies, for example, vapour-compression air-conditioning (VCAC) has a low coefficient of performance (COP) due to the refrigeration dehumidification process, which often makes necessary a great deal of subsequent re-heating. Technologies using conventional desiccants or sorbents for indoor moisture control are even less competitive than VCAC due to their high regeneration temperature, long cycling time and bulky components.

This project aims at developing a novel device called “humidity pump”, which can efficiently transfer the moisture in air from a low-humidity space to a high-humidity one. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) will be used as desiccant materials. Compared to the existing moisture control systems, the new humidity pump will have higher moisture transfer capacity, higher overall COP and less bulky and easy for different humidity-control applications and processes, for example, the microelectronics industry, and the storage of artworks in museums etc.