MODELING ACTIVE MAGNETIC REGENERATIVE REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS

The parallel development of families of magnetocaloric material alloys with adjustable Curie temperatures and the demonstration of practical implementations of active magnetic regenerative refrigeration (AMRR) cycles have brought this technology to the point where it is being considered for a wide variety of applications. This paper describes a non-proprietary yet powerful numerical modeling tool that is capable of predicting the practical limits of performance of an AMRR using a variety of materials (including a layered bed), matrix geometries, operating conditions, etc. The one-dimensional transient model solves the governing energy balance in order to obtain the temperature history of the fluid and matrix over a complete cycle. The resulting one-dimensional transient model with coupled fluid/regenerator heat capacity is fully implicit and therefore computationally efficient; this allows the model to be used for many applications including parametric design, integration with balance of plant hardware, and system optimization. This paper presents the details of this model and provides a few examples that illustrate its utility.