19
Performance characteristics of counter flow wet cooling towers Jameel-Ur-Rehman Khan, M. Yaqub, Syed M. Zubair * Department of Mechanical Engineering, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Mail Box 1474, Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia Received 16 June 2002; accepted 23 September 2002 Abstract Cooling towers are one of the biggest heat and mass transfer devices that are in widespread use. In this paper, we use a detailed model of counter flow wet cooling towers in investigating the performance characteristics. The validity of the model is checked by experimental data reported in the literature. The thermal performance of the cooling towers is clearly explained in terms of varying air and water tempera- tures, as well as the driving potential for convection and evaporation heat transfer, along the height of the tower. The relative contribution of each mode of heat transfer rate to the total heat transfer rate in the cooling tower is established. It is demonstrated with an example problem that the predominant mode of heat transfer is evaporation. For example, evaporation contributes about 62.5% of the total rate of heat transfer at the bottom of the tower and almost 90% at the top of the tower. The variation of air and water temperatures along the height of the tower (process line) is explained on psychometric charts. Ó 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Cooling towers; Model; Performance evaluation 1. Introduction Cooling towers, as shown schematically in Fig. 1, consist of large chambers loosely filled with trays or decks of wooden boards as slats or of PVC material. The water to be cooled is pumped to the top of the tower, where it is distributed over the top deck by sprays or distributor troughs made of wood or PVC material. It then falls and splashes from deck-to-deck down through the tower. Air is permitted to pass through the tower horizontally due to wind currents (cross flow) or vertically upward (counter current) to the falling water droplets. In the case of counter current Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 2073–2091 www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman * Corresponding author. Tel.: +966-3-860-3135; fax: +966-3-860-2949. E-mail address: [email protected] (S.M. Zubair). 0196-8904/02/$ - see front matter Ó 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/S0196-8904(02)00231-5

Performance Charateristics of Counter Flow Wet Cooling Towers

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  • Performance characteristics of counter ow wet cooling towers

    Jameel-Ur-Rehman Khan, M. Yaqub, Syed M. Zubair *

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, Mail Box 1474,

    Dhahran 31261, Saudi Arabia

    Received 16 June 2002; accepted 23 September 2002

    Abstract

    Cooling towers are one of the biggest heat and mass transfer devices that are in widespread use. In this

    paper, we use a detailed model of counter ow wet cooling towers in investigating the performance

    characteristics. The validity of the model is checked by experimental data reported in the literature. The

    thermal performance of the cooling towers is clearly explained in terms of varying air and water tempera-

    tures, as well as the driving potential for convection and evaporation heat transfer, along the height of the

    tower. The relative contribution of each mode of heat transfer rate to the total heat transfer rate in thecooling tower is established. It is demonstrated with an example problem that the predominant mode of

    heat transfer is evaporation. For example, evaporation contributes about 62.5% of the total rate of heat

    transfer at the bottom of the tower and almost 90% at the top of the tower. The variation of air and water

    temperatures along the height of the tower (process line) is explained on psychometric charts.

    2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

    Keywords: Cooling towers; Model; Performance evaluation

    1. Introduction

    Cooling towers, as shown schematically in Fig. 1, consist of large chambers loosely lled withtrays or decks of wooden boards as slats or of PVC material. The water to be cooled is pumped tothe top of the tower, where it is distributed over the top deck by sprays or distributor troughsmade of wood or PVC material. It then falls and splashes from deck-to-deck down through thetower. Air is permitted to pass through the tower horizontally due to wind currents (cross ow) orvertically upward (counter current) to the falling water droplets. In the case of counter current

    Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

    *Corresponding author. Tel.: +966-3-860-3135; fax: +966-3-860-2949.

    E-mail address: [email protected] (S.M. Zubair).

    0196-8904/02/$ - see front matter 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/S0196-8904(02)00231-5

  • Nomenclature

    AV surface area of water droplets per unit volume of tower, m2/m3

    cpa specic heat at constant pressure of moist air, kJ/kga Kcw specic heat of water, kJ/kgw KE slope of the tie line, kJ/kgw Kh enthalpy of moist air, kJ/kgahc convective heat transfer coecient of air, kW/m2 Khc;w convective heat transfer coecient of water, kW/m2 KhD convective mass transfer coecient, kgw/m2 shf specic enthalpy of saturated liquid water, kJ/kgwhf;w specic enthalpy of water evaluated at tw, kJ/kgwhg specic enthalpy of saturated water vapor, kJ/kgwh0g specic enthalpy of saturated water vapor evaluated at 0 C, kJ/kgwhfg;w change of phase enthalpy hfg;w hg;w hf ;w, kJ/kgwhs;w enthalpy of saturated moist air evaluated at tw, kJ/kgahs;int enthalpy of saturated moist air evaluated at tint, kJ/kgaLe Lewis number Le hc=hDcp;a_mma mass ow rate of dry air, kga/s_mmw mass ow rate of water, kgw/sNTU number of transfer unitsPQ percentage heat rate(Q=Qtot)Pr Prandtl numberSc Schmidt numbert dry bulb temperature of moist air, Ctint airwater interface temperature, Ctw water temperature, CV volume of tower, m3

    W humidity ratio of moist air, kgw/kgaWs;w humidity ratio of saturated moist air evaluated at tw, kgw/kgae eectiveness

    Subscripts

    a moist airdb dry bulbem empiricalg,w vapor at water temperaturei inletint airwater interfacemax maximumo outlets,w saturated moist air at water temperaturew water

    2074 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • towers, the air motion is due to the natural chimney eect of the warm moist air in the tower ormay be caused by fans at the bottom (forced draft) or at the top (induced draft) of the tower.Walker et al. [1] was the rst to propose a basic theory of cooling tower operation. The

    practical use of basic dierential equations, however, was rst presented by Merkel [2], in whichhe combined the equations for heat and water vapor transfer. He showed the utility of total heator enthalpy dierence as a driving force to allow for both sensible and latent heats. The basicpostulations and approximations that are inherent in Merkels theory are:

    the resistance for heat transfer in the liquid lm is negligible; the mass ow rate of water per unit cross sectional area of the tower is constant, i.e. there is noloss of water due to evaporation;

    w,i water inletw,o water outletwb,i wet bulb inletwb,o wet bulb outlet

    Superscriptscal calculatedexp experimental

    Fig. 1. Schematic of a wet counter ow cooling tower.

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2075

  • the specic heat of the airsteam mixture at constant pressure is the same as that of dry air; the Lewis number for humid air is unity.

    It should be noted that the formulation and implementation of Merkels theory in coolingtower design and performance evaluation is presented and discussed in most unit operations andprocess heat transfer textbooks.

    2. Literature review

    Webb [3] performed a unied theoretical treatment for thermal analysis of cooling towers,evaporative condensers and evaporative uid coolers. In this paper, specic calculation proce-dures are explained for sizing and rating each type of evaporative exchanger. In another paper,Webb and Villacres [4] described three computer algorithms that have been developed to performrating calculations of three evaporatively cooled heat exchangers. The algorithms are particularlyuseful for rating commercially available heat exchangers at part load conditions. The heat andmass transfer characteristic equation of one of the heat exchangers is derived from the manu-facturers rating data at the design point.Jaber and Webb [5] presented an analysis that shows how the theory of heat exchanger design

    may be applied to cooling towers. They demonstrated that the eectiveness e and NTUs de-nitions are in very good agreement with those used for heat exchanger design and are applicable toall cooling tower operating conditions. It is important to note that they did not consider heattransfer resistance in the airwater interface and the eect of water evaporation on the air processstates along the vertical length of the tower. The results are only applicable for Lewis numberequal to one. Furthermore, they used Merkels approximation of replacing the sum of the singlephase heat transfer from the waterair interface to the air and the mass transfer (evaporation ofwater) at the interface with the enthalpy as a driving potential.Braun et al. [6] presented eectiveness models for cooling towers and cooling coils. The models

    utilize existing thermal eectiveness relationships developed for sensible heat exchangers withmodied denitions for the number of transfer units and the uid capacitance rate ratio. Theresults of the models were compared with those of more detailed numerical solutions to the basicheat and mass transfer equations and experimental data. They also did not consider the eect ofairwater interface temperature, however, they did consider the eect of water evaporation on theair process states along the vertical length of the tower. The results are only presented for a Lewisnumber equal to unity.Dessouky et al. [7] presented a solution for the steady state counter ow wet cooling tower with

    new denitions of tower eectiveness and number of transfer units. Their model is essentially amodied version of Jaber and Webbs model with the inclusion of Lewis number, which appearsas a multiplication factor to the enthalpy driving potential. They did consider the eect of in-terface temperature and Lewis number, however, the eect of water evaporation on the air processstates along the vertical length is not considered. Furthermore, they used an approximate equa-tion for calculating the moist air enthalpy, which was obtained by curve tting the tabu-lated thermodynamic properties of saturated airwater vapor mixtures. It is important to notethat the calculation of moist air properties should be accurate to obtain reliable results. Jorge and

    2076 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • Armando [8] tested a new closed wet cooling tower for use in chilled ceilings in buildings. Theyalso obtained experimental correlations for the heat and mass transfer coecients and concludedthat existing thermal models were found to predict reliably the thermal performance of coolingtowers. Bernier [9,10] explained the performance of a cooling tower by examining the heat andmass transfer mechanism from a single water droplet to the ambient air. He did not consider theeect of air temperature as it moved from the bottom to the top of the tower. Nimr [11] presenteda mathematical model to describe the thermal behavior of cooling towers that contain packingmaterials. The model takes into account both sensible and latent eects on the tower performance.A closed form solution was obtained for both the transient and steady temperature distribution ina cooling tower. Jose [12] dened a new parameter thermo uid dynamic eciency, to quantifythe performances of cooling tower lls and concluded that it is independent of the cooling towerheight.The objective of this paper is to investigate the heat and mass transfer mechanisms from a water

    droplet in a cooling tower as the air moves in the vertical direction. In this regard, for the sake ofcompleteness, we rst discuss briey the model of the tower, in which we have used reliable airwater thermodynamic property equations that are formulated by Hyland and Wexler [13,14]. It isthen followed by results and discussions related to the heat and mass transfer mechanisms of awater droplet as it travels from the top to the bottom of the tower.

    3. Analysis of a cooling tower

    A schematic of a counter ow cooling tower, showing the important states, is presented inFig. 2. The major assumptions that are used to derive the basic modeling equations may besummarized as [15,16]:

    heat and mass transfer is in a direction normal to the ows only; negligible heat and mass transfer through the tower walls to the environment; negligible heat transfer from the tower fans to the air or water streams; constant water and dry air specic heats; constant heat and mass transfer coecients throughout the tower; constant value of Lewis number throughout the tower; water lost by drift is negligible; uniform temperature throughout the water stream at each cross section; and uniform cross sectional area of the tower.

    From the steady state energy and mass balances on an incremental volume (refer to Fig. 2), thefollowing equation may be written [16]

    _mma dh _mmw dhf;w _mma dW hf;w 1We may also write the water energy balance in terms of the heat and mass transfer coecients, hcand hD, respectively, as

    _mmw dhf;w hcAV dV tw t hDAV dV Ws;w W hfg;w 2

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2077

  • and the air side water vapor mass balance as

    _mma dW hDAV dV Ws;w W 3By substitution of the Lewis number as Le hc=hDcpa in Eq. (2), we get, after simplication,

    _mmw dhf ;w hDAV dV Lecpatw t Ws;w W hfg;w 4Notice that we have dened Lewis number in Eq. (4) similar to the denition that is used by

    Braun et al. [6] and Kuehn et al. [15], however, Jaber and Webb [5] and El-Dessouky et al. [7] haveused Le Sc=Pr, commonly used in heat and mass transfer literature. In this regard, we prefer tostick to the notation of Kuehn et al. [15] that is considered as one of the standard references incooling tower literature. Combining Eqs. (1)(4), we get, after some simplication [16],

    dhdW

    Le hs;w hWs;w W hg;w h0gLe 5

    It should be noted that Eq. (5) describes the condition line on the psychometric chart for thechanges in state for moist air passing through the tower. For given water temperatures tw;i; tw;o,Lewis number (Le), inlet condition of air and mass ow rates, Eqs. (1) and (5) may be solvednumerically for the exit conditions of both the air and water stream. The solution is iterative withrespect to the air humidity ratio and temperatures (W , t and tw). At each iteration, Eqs. (1)(5) can

    Fig. 2. Mass and energy balance of a wet counter ow cooling tower [15,16].

    2078 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • be integrated numerically over the entire tower volume from air inlet to outlet by a proceduresimilar to that described in Kuehn et al. [15] and Khan and Zubair [16].In deriving Eqs. (1)(5), it was assumed that there is no resistance to heat ow in the interface

    between the air and water. In other words, the interface temperature was assumed to be equal tothe bulk water temperature. However, for heat transfer to take place between the air and water,the temperature of the interface lm must be less than the bulk water temperature, as shown inFig. 3. In that case, all the terms in Eqs. (1)(5) with the subscripts (s, w) will be replaced bysubscript (s, int). Webb [5] assumed that tw is nearly equal to tint 0:5.Fig. 3 shows both the enthalpies of the saturated airwater vapor mixture and tower operating

    line as a function of water temperature. Considering the short distance between hs;w and hs;int onthe saturation curve as a straight line, the following simple relationship can be easily deduced [7],

    hs;w h hs;w hs;int Etw tint 6where E is the slope of the tie line and is constant for a given cooling tower. This slope is given by

    E hc;w=hD 7The above equation can be used for obtaining the interface temperature. However, for largevalues of E, the interface and bulk water temperatures are almost equal.A computer program written by Khan and Zubair [16] is used for solving Eqs. (1)(5) nu-

    merically, and the ow chart of the program is shown in Fig. 4. In this program, the properties ofthe airwater vapor mixture and moist air are needed at each step of the numerical calculation.These properties are obtained from the property equations given in Hyland and Wexler [13,14],which are also used by ASHRAE [17] in computing airwater vapor thermodynamic properties.The program gives the dry bulb temperature, wet bulb temperature of air, water temperature andhumidity ratio of air at each step of the numerical calculation starting from the air inlet to the airoutlet values. If the value of hDAV is known, the required tower volume may be obtained byusing [16]:

    Enth

    alpy

    kJ/k

    g dr

    y ai

    r

    0

    100

    200

    Saturated Air

    air operating line

    10 50

    hs,int

    hs,w

    hE=-

    E=

    h s,w

    h-

    h s,in

    th

    -

    Water Temperature Co

    TaTintTw

    Tw > >Tint Ta

    Dhc,wh

    Fig. 3. Water operating line on enthalpytemperature diagram indicating the eect of tie line E hc;w=hD onsaturated moist air enthalpy [16].

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2079

  • Fig. 4. Flow chart of the computer model.

    2080 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • V _mmahDAV

    Z WoWi

    dWWs;w W 8

    The integral in the above equation is solved numerically. The number of transfer units of thetower is calculated by

    NTU hDAV V = _mma Z WoWi

    dWWs;w W 9

    The cooling tower eectiveness e is dened as the ratio of the actual energy transfer to themaximum possible energy transfer

    e ho hihs;w;i hi 10

    Correlations for the heat and mass transfer of cooling towers in terms of physical parameters donot exist. It is usually necessary to correlate the tower performance data for specic tower designs.Mass transfer data are typically correlated in the form [18]:

    hDAV V_mmw

    c _mmw_mma

    !n11

    where c and n are empirical constants specic to a particular tower design. Multiplying both sidesof the above equation by _mmw= _mma and considering the denition for NTU (refer to Eq. (9)) givesthe empirical value of NTU as

    NTUem c _mmw_mma

    !n112

    The coecients c and n of the above equation were t to the measurements of Simpson andSherwood [19] for four dierent tower designs over a range of performance conditions by Braunet al. [6]. Their experimental values were also compared with the values obtained by our model,and the results are discussed in Khan and Zubair [16]. It was shown that the calculated andempirical values of NTU are well within acceptable limits. Also, the wet bulb temperature of theoutlet air twb;o calculated from the present model is compared with the experimental valuesreported in Simpson and Sherwood [19], and the two values are very close to each other (within0.6%).

    4. Performance characteristics

    It is commonly believed that the evaporation heat transfer rate inside the cooling tower is muchgreater than the convective heat transfer rate. To investigate the contribution of evaporation heattransfer in a cooling tower, a study is conducted on a water droplet as it moves from the top to thebottom of the tower, whereas the air that is used to cool the water is forced from the bottom of thetower in a counter ow arrangement. In this regard, the heat transfer rates from a single waterdroplet (of 3 mm diameter) inside the cooling tower due to convection and evaporation wereexpressed, respectively, as

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2081

  • _QQconv hcAV tw tdb 13_QQevap hDAV Ws;w Wahfg;w 14

    The computer program for simulating the performance of the cooling tower, explained in theprevious section, was used for analyzing the heat transfer rates for the following set of input data:tdb;i 29:0 C, twb;i 21:11 C, tw;i 28:72 C, tw;o 24:22 C, hDAV 3:025 kg/sm3, Le 0:9and _mma 1:187 kg/s. At each incremental control volume, measured from the top of the tower, theprogram calculates the thermodynamic properties of the airwater mixture that are then used tocalculate the heat transfer rates from the water droplet by using Eqs. (13) and (14). The resultsfrom the program are plotted in Figs. 519. In these gures, the eects of water to air mass owrate ratios on the airwater temperatures, as well as the driving potential for convectiveevapo-rative heat transfer rates are investigated. In this regard, the ratio of mass ow rate of water tomass ow rate of air, _mmw= _mma, is varied from 0.5 to 1.5 at an interval of 0.5.Fig. 5 is a plot of the air and water temperatures versus volume of tower. The water falls from

    the top and its temperature, tw, decreases continuously as it approaches the bottom of the tower.This is generally expected in a cooling tower because the water loses heat both by convection andevaporation. It is interesting to see that the air, which enters from the bottom of the tower withinitial dry bulb temperature, tdb, decreases in temperature and then increases before leaving fromthe top of the tower. This can be explained from the fact that the water, which enters from the topof the tower, when it reaches the lower part, is cooled because of a predominantly evaporationmechanism. In this region, the water temperature, tw, is much lower than the entering air dry bulbtemperature, tdb, however, as we note from Fig. 5, when the tower volume from the top reaches

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.820

    22

    24

    26

    28

    30

    tdb

    tw

    twb

    Tem

    pera

    ture

    (C

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 5. Variation of dry and wet bulb temperature of air and water temperature with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 0:50.

    2082 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • above 0.15 m3, the water temperature is less than tdb. This results in heat transfer from the air tothe water (i.e. negative convection). The intersection point of the tdb and tw curves indicates no

    20

    22

    24

    26

    28

    30

    tdb

    tw

    twb

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8

    Tem

    pera

    ture

    (C

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 6. Variation of dry and wet bulb temperature of air and water temperature with volume of tower for

    _mmw= _mma 1:00.

    20

    22

    24

    26

    28

    30

    tdb

    tw

    twb

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8

    Tem

    pera

    ture

    (C

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 7. Variation of dry and wet bulb temperature of air and water temperature with volume of tower for

    _mmw= _mma 1:50.

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2083

  • temperature dierence. At this point, there is no convection heat exchange between the water andthe air. Furthermore, below this point tdb is less than tw, which results in heat transfer from thewater to the air (i.e. positive convection). As expected, the wet bulb temperature of the air twb

    Fig. 8. Variation of driving potential for convection and evaporation heat transfer with volume of tower for

    _mmw= _mma 0:50.

    Fig. 9. Variation of driving potential for convection and evaporation heat transfer with volume of tower for

    _mmw= _mma 1:00.

    2084 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • decreases continuously in the tower from the top to the bottom. It approaches the water outlettemperature at the bottom of the tower.

    Fig. 10. Variation of driving potential for convection and evaporation heat transfer with volume of tower for

    _mmw= _mma 1:50.

    -1

    0

    1

    2

    3

    Qevap

    Qtotal

    Qconv

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8

    Hea

    t Rat

    es "Q

    " (W

    atts

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 11. Variation of heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 0:50.

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2085

  • The eect of mass ow rate ratio _mmw= _mma is investigated by varying the mass ow rate of water,_mmw, while keeping the air ow rate, _mma, constant. The results are shown in Figs. 57. We note that

    Qevap

    Qtotal

    Qconv

    -1

    0

    1

    2

    3

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8

    Hea

    t Rat

    es "Q

    " (W

    atts

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 12. Variation of heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 1:00.

    Qevap

    Qtotal

    Qconv

    -1

    0

    1

    2

    3

    0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8

    Hea

    t Rat

    es "Q

    " (W

    atts

    )

    Volume of Tower "V" m3

    Fig. 13. Variation of heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 1:50.

    2086 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • with the increase in water mass ow rate, the dry bulb temperature of the air decreases over arelatively small height of the tower, and also the temperature drop of water is less with the in-crease in _mmw. This can be explained from the fact that with an increase in mass ow rate ratio,more water is to be cooled for a given tower volume. Therefore, one would expect that the surface

    Fig. 14. Variation of percent heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 0:50.

    Fig. 15. Variation of percent heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 1:00.

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2087

  • area required both for convection and evaporation will be reduced, resulting in higher water outlettemperatures and reduced heat transfer rates.The driving potentials for evaporative heat transfer Ws;w Wa and convective heat transfer

    tw tdb versus tower volume are presented in Figs. 810 for _mmw= _mma varying from 0.5 to 1.5 at aninterval of 0.5. We note that the humidity ratio of saturated moist air, Ws;w decreases with towervolume measured from the top because the water temperature decreases as it moves down, while

    Fig. 16. Variation of percent heat rates with volume of tower for _mmw= _mma 1:50.

    75

    50

    0

    0.04

    0.01

    0.03

    0.02

    50

    75

    100

    125

    25 30

    100

    125

    150

    175

    200

    225

    250

    275

    Entha

    lpy (k

    J/kg o

    f dry

    air)

    RH = 20%

    0.08

    0.06

    0.04

    0.02

    0

    Dry Bulb Temperature (C)10 20 30 40 50 60

    Hum

    idity

    Rat

    io (k

    g of

    moi

    stur

    e/kg

    of d

    ry a

    ir)

    Fig. 17. Process line of water cooling in cooling tower for _mmw= _mma 0:50.

    2088 J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091

  • the humidity ratio of moist air, Wa increases with tower volume measured from the bottom becausethe air absorbs moisture as it move upwards. These gures show that the potential for evaporationdecreases rst and then increases with the tower volume, particularly for _mmw= _mma 0:5. However,for _mmw= _mma P 1:0, the potential increases with tower volume. On the other hand, the driving po-tential for convection heat transfer tw tdb decreases with tower volume, and it becomes negativeafter reaching some height of the tower. It, therefore, results in a negative convective heat transferin the tower (from water to air). As explained above, the negative convection in the tower occurswhen the water temperature is lower than the air dry bulb temperature.

    75

    50

    0

    0.04

    0.01

    0.03

    0.02

    50

    75

    100

    125

    25 30

    100

    125

    150

    175

    200

    225

    250

    275

    Entha

    lpy (k

    J/kg o

    f dry

    air)

    RH = 20%

    0.08

    0.06

    0.04

    0.02

    0

    Dry Bulb Temperature (C)10 20 30 40 50 60

    Hum

    idity

    Rat

    io (k

    g of

    moi

    stur

    e/kg

    of d

    ry a

    ir)

    Fig. 18. Process line of water cooling in cooling tower for _mmw= _mma 1:00.

    75

    50

    0

    0.04

    0.01

    0.03

    0.02

    50

    75

    100

    125

    25 30

    100

    125

    150

    175

    200

    225

    250

    275

    Entha

    lpy (k

    J/kg o

    f dry

    air)

    RH = 20%

    0.08

    0.06

    0.04

    0.02

    0

    Dry Bulb Temperature (C)10 20 30 40 50 60

    Hum

    idity

    Rat

    io (k

    g of

    moi

    stur

    e/kg

    of d

    ry a

    ir)

    Fig. 19. Process line of water cooling in cooling tower for _mmw= _mma 1:50.

    J.-U.-R. Khan et al. / Energy Conversion and Management 44 (2003) 20732091 2089

  • The convection and evaporation heat transfer rates _QQconv, _QQevap and _QQtotal _QQconv _QQevap areplotted as a function of tower volume measured from the top of the tower in Figs. 1113. Thesegures show that the heat transfer rates are high in the top portions of the tower and decrease asthe water moves from the top to the bottom of the tower, particularly for _mmw= _mma6 1. Thesegures, however, indicate that the total heat rate increases for _mmw= _mma P 1 and is mainly controlledby the evaporation mechanism. In the region where the heat transfer is taking place from air towater; i.e. negative convection, the evaporation heat rates are generally high. These gures clearlyshow that evaporation is basically controlling the total heat ow in a cooling tower.The percentage heat rates due to convection and evaporation PQconv and PQevap, are plotted

    in Figs. 1416 as a function of tower volume for dierent mass ow rate ratios, _mmw= _mma. Asdiscussed above, _QQconv decreases with _mmw= _mma. Therefore, a high percentage is noted for _mmw= _mma lessthan 1.0, particularly in the region where the convection is taking place from air to water, i.e. theconvection component is negative. These gures clearly show that the percentage of the evapo-ration component is always positive and is highest for low mass ow rate ratios.The process lines of the air on a psychometric chart are presented in Figs. 1719 for dierent

    values of _mmw= _mma. These curves show that the dry bulb temperature at the outlet of the tower isalways less than that at the inlet for the conditions investigated in this study. However, the relativehumidity and the specic humidity of the air increase as the air moves from the bottom to the topof the tower. This implies that the air is also going to cool in the tower, along with the water,because of evaporation of water in the tower. It should be noted that when water evaporates in thetower, it needs heat that is taken from both water and air. Therefore, one would expect thepossibility of cooling both air and water in the tower.

    5. Concluding remarks

    A reliable computer model of a counter ow wet cooling tower has been used to study the heattransfer mechanisms from a water droplet as it moves from the top to the bottom of the tower,while the air is forced vertically upward. It is clearly demonstrated that the water temperature, tw,decreases continuously as it approaches the bottom of the tower. However, air, which acts as acoolant, enters from the bottom of the tower, initially at its dry bulb temperature, tdb, decreases intemperature and then increases before leaving from the top of the tower. This cooling phenomenonof the air, i.e. negative convection, in some parts of the tower, along with the water, is explained dueto evaporation of the water in the tower. It is demonstrated that in the negative convection regionof the tower, the evaporation rates are generally high. The eect of water to air mass ow rate ratio,_mmw= _mma, is investigated by varying the mass ow rate of water, _mmw, while keeping the air ow rate,_mma, constant. The results clearly demonstrate that with an increase in water mass ow rate for thesame ll packing, the surface area required both for convection and evaporation is reduced, re-sulting in higher water outlet temperatures and reduced heat transfer rates.

    Acknowledgements

    The authors acknowledge the support provided by King Fahd University of Petroleum andMinerals through the research project (ME/RISK-FOULING/230).

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    Performance characteristics of counter flow wet cooling towersIntroductionAcknowledgementsReferences