Estimating capacity of a reagent-free evaporative cooling tower with jet-film contact elements

The purpose of this article is to evaluate the efficiency and throughput capacity of the jet-film contact device as well as its comparison with analogues by various criteria. Consideration is given to the cooling of circulating water in a contactless evaporative cooling tower using jet-film contact elements developed by the authors for the use at industrial enterprises of heat power engineering and other industries. For cooling the main flow, a "closed" circuit is used whereas a nozzle block is used to reduce the temperature of the rest of the liquid. The developed contact device is compared with domestic and world contact models. The process flow diagram of the cooling tower with a closed cooling circuit, which allows to reduce the use of chemical reagents is made. An original design of a jet-film contact device operating in a wide range of running speeds and featuring a large constantly renewing surface area of the phase contact is proposed. A comparative analysis of the developed design of the contact device with its analogues is carried out: the hydraulic resistance is determined depending on the average flow rate of gas. The technical characteristics of the nozzle block are given depending on device geometric dimensions. The F-factor (air velocity- its density root product) of the design is calculated when changing the irrigation density and the width of the drain cup. It is determined that the device operates in a wide range of loads, has a good throughput capacity and reaches high values of the F-factor. The developed design of the jet-film contact device provides an effective cooling of water, while the use of a closed circuit when cooling the main flow of recycled water significantly reduces the processing by chemical reagents.

reagent-free cooling tower, jet-film contact device, heat and mass transfer, hydraulic resistance, capacity