Abstract
Thermodynamic irreversibility analysis of an air-to-water heat pump system is analyzed in this study. This analysis shows the distribution of irreversibilities(true losses in thermodynamic sense) through the system components and informs us of a potential improvements with the irreversibility factor decreases. The results show that the largest irreversibilities occur in the motor-compressor unit. The remaining irreversibilities are distributed relatively uniformly through the other parts including utilization system. The increase of performance can be attained through either the improvement of adiabatic efficiency of motor-compressor unit(${\eta}_{mc}$) or the reduction of temperature difference(${\Delta}T$). With the decrease of utilization temperature($T_u$) COPH also increases but the exergetic efficiency decreases. The increase of COPH of about 0.05 can be accomplished with 1K decrease of ${\Delta}T$ or $T_u$.
