Experimental study of direct contact steam condensation in structured packing

Abstract

An experimental study of direct contact steam condensation has been conducted at both atmospheric and vacuum pressure, in a pilot scale column filled with Tupac 125Y structured packing. The local volumetric heat transfer coefficient of condensation determined by thermal balance has been given. The influences of the vapor and liquid flow rate, liquid temperature and operation pressure have been investigated. An empirical correlation based on dimensionless numbers has been put forward and verified by various experimental measurements, and the dimensionless numbers were calculated from the Delft hydrodynamic model of structured packing. The results will give some helpful guidance in the design and operation of direct contact condensers with structured packings. Specific surface area, a p (m 2 m À3 ) 126.55 Corrugation base length, b (m) 0.042 Corrugation height, h (m) 0.024 Corrugation side length, s (m) 0.0319 Corrugation inclination angle, a ( ) 4 5 Void fraction, e 0.99 Opening ratio, Ω 0.08 X. LI ET AL. Asia-Pacific Journal of Chemical Engineering 658

Sizing of Packed Deaeration Columns

“…The preliminary direction for the analysis was deducted based on the results published in [8]. Namely, after verifying the results published therein using the described methods, it was found that the dependency between the real heat transfer coefficient and the heat transfer coefficient in liquid obtained by using the similarity theory and procedure [4] has the following form:…”

“…The measured values reported in the aforementioned source were evaluated using the same criteria as the ones which the authors of this paper have applied to validate their own measurement values, and which are reported in the above text. This analysis revealed that the experimental measurements are of high quality.…”

Transient analysis of the steam‐water direct contact condensation in the packed column

“…Many experimental and theoretical works have been performed on steam-water direct contact condensation in the packed column. [4][5][6][7] Bharathan et al [4] developed a one-dimensional, steady-state model that captures the heat, mass, and momentum processes of steam-water direct contact condensation in the presence of non-condensable gases. Huang and Fair [5] performed a reasonable method to use the mass transfer data to predict the heat transfer coefficients with the heat/mass transfer analogy, depending on type of packed bed and flow rates.…”

“…Huang and Fair [5] performed a reasonable method to use the mass transfer data to predict the heat transfer coefficients with the heat/mass transfer analogy, depending on type of packed bed and flow rates. Li et al [6] established an experimental setup for the investigation of heat transfer capacity of Tupac 125Y structured packing in steam-water direct contact condensation at both atmospheric and vacuum pressure. The results showed that condensation efficiency in vacuum was higher than that in the atmospheric pressure.…”

“…Based on the conclusions above, the steam is mainly condensed in the initial period of experiments. Therefore, the experimental data within time constant are used to calculate the volumetric heat transfer coefficient through Equations (4)(5)(6)(7)(8). That is, the steam temperature T s,j is the average value of the four temperature measuring points (T 1 ; T 2 ; T 3 ; T 4 ) at t ¼ time constant.…”