ABSTRACT

Petrol powered generators produce a lot of heat during operation and this waste heat is harmful to the environment. Due to lack of technology for proper management of waste heat and with the increasing number of petrol generator users, this environmental challenge will continue to worsen. This work therefore presents an investigation into the possible use of this waste heat for clothes drying to maximize petrol generator energy utilization. This entails reviewing petrol generator usage in Nigeria, analyzing waste heat from such petrol generators, reviewing possible use of such waste heat for purposes such as drying of clothes, designing, constructing and testing of a waste heat recovery dryer and comparing the efficiency of drying with natural drying method. It was observed that a cloth with a 0.3kg moisture content dried completely within 6 hours using the experimental device amounting to an average of 0.001972kg of moisture removed from the cloth per minute (0.118kg/hr) while the conventional method gave an average moisture removal rate of 0.002367kg of moisture per minute (0.142kg/hr) for a similar cloth. Investigation carried out implied that harnessing waste heat from petrol generators for clothes drying is viable and effective and that over 30% of input energy of most generators are wasted and emitted to the atmosphere. The study recommended that further studies be carried out to effectively utilize waste heat from various power generating equipment in Nigeria and there should be a government backed legislation to support and enforce the recovering and effective use of waste heat from power machineries for viable purposes and reduce atmospheric pollution which has been suspected to lead to global warming in recent times.