Thermal Investigation of an Electrocaloric Refrigeration Systems

Electrocaloric cooling based on electrocaloric materials (ferroelectrics materials) is an environmentally friendly refrigeration technology with high cooling power and tempurature span. Electrocaloic refrigeration is based on the ECE (electrocaloric effect); The electrocaloric effect is an intrinsic property of certain materials having the particularity of being ferroelectric (ceramics, single crystals and polymers).The principle of the electrocaloric effect is based on an adiabatic and reversible polarization/depolarization of the electric dipoles under the action of an electric field.Thus, the application and stopping of the electric field induces an electrocaloric cooling cycle composed of four stages. In this paper, we studied the effect of regenerator geometry (parallel plates, packed bed (cylinder) and perforated plates) in an electrocaloric refrigeration systems.