Influence of unsuitable operational conditions on the transient performance of a small hydrogen liquefier

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Malek Ashtar University of Technology

2 Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Chemical Engineering, Malek Ashtar University of Technology (MUT), Lavizan 158751774, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

Joule-Thomson cooling systems are used in refrigeration processes such as cryogenic gas liquefaction. Although extensive studies have been carried out by researchers, most of them include cryogenic heat exchangers and their associated fields. In the current study, an attempt was made to indicate the effect of using inappropriate operational conditions in a cryogenic Joule-Thomson cooling system including recuperative heat exchanger, expansion valve and collector. Mass flow rate and operational pressure were selected as design parameters while cool-down time and final temperature of high-pressure gas at heat exchanger outlet were considered as responses. The results showed that using mass flow rate smaller than the design value led to considerable decrease in performance. Operational pressure had lesser effect on cool-down time. Increasing the pressure had no significant effect on the gas temperature at expansion valve inlet for high mass flow rates. Using unsuitable values for mass flow rate and operational pressure might lead to fail liquefaction despite using heat exchanger with high effectiveness.

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

[1]  Garceau N. M.,  Baik J. H.,  Lim C. M.,  Kim S. Y.,  Oh I.-H.,Karng S. W., "Development of a small-scale hydrogen liquefaction system", Int. J. Hydrogen Energy, 2015, 40: 11872.
 
[2] Acar C. and Dincer I., "Comparative assessment of hydrogen production methods from renewable and non-renewable sources", Int. J. Hydrogen Energy, 2014, 39: 1.
 
[3] Saberimoghaddam A. and Bahri Rasht Abadi M. M., "How to Design a Cryogenic Joule-Thomson Cooling System: Case Study of Small Hydrogen Liquefier", Iranian Journal of Hydrogen & Fuel Cell, 2016, 3:113.
 
[4] Saberimoghaddam A., Abadi B. R.,Mahdi M., "Evaluation of recuperative tube-in-tube heat exchanger operating in cryogenic refrigeration process: simulation-based transient study", Asia-Pacific Journal of Chemical Engineering, 2017, 12: 85.
 
[5] Damle R. and Atrey M., "The cool-down behaviour of a miniature Joule–Thomson (J–T) cryocooler with distributed J–T effect and finite reservoir capacity", Cryogenics, 2015, 71: 47.
 
[6] Saberimoghaddam A. and Bahri Rasht Abadi M. M., "Influence of tube wall longitudinal heat conduction on temperature measurement of cryogenic gas with low mass flow rates", Measurement, 2016, 83: 20.
 
[7] Pacio J. C. and Dorao C. A., "A review on heat exchanger thermal hydraulic models for cryogenic applications", Cryogenics, 2011, 51: 366.
 
[8] Aminuddin M. and Zubair S. M., "Characterization of various losses in a cryogenic counterflow heat exchanger", Cryogenics, 2014, 64: 77.
 
[9] Krishna V.,  Spoorthi S.,  Hegde P. G.,Seetharamu K., "Effect of longitudinal wall conduction on the performance of a three-fluid cryogenic heat exchanger with three thermal communications", Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer, 2013, 62: 567.
 
[10] Gupta P. K.,  Kush P.,Tiwari A., "Second law analysis of counter flow cryogenic heat exchangers in presence of ambient heat-in-leak and longitudinal conduction through wall", Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer, 2007, 50: 4754.
 
[11] Nellis G., "A heat exchanger model that includes axial conduction, parasitic heat loads, and property variations", Cryogenics, 2003, 43: 523.
 
[12] Narayanan S. P. and Venkatarathnam G., "Performance of a counterflow heat exchanger with heat loss through the wall at the cold end", Cryogenics, 1999, 39: 43.
 
[13] Ranganayakulu C., Seetharamu K.,Sreevatsan K., "The effects of longitudinal heat conduction in compact plate-fin and tube-fin heat exchangers using a finite element method", Int. J. Heat Mass Transfer, 1997, 40: 1261.
 
[14] Chou F.-C., Pai C.-F.,  Chien S.,Chen J., "Preliminary experimental and numerical study of transient characteristics for a Joule-Thomson cryocooler", Cryogenics, 1995, 35: 311.
 
[15] Tzabar N. and Kaplansky A., "A numerical cool-down analysis for Dewar-detector assemblies cooled with Joule–Thomson cryocoolers", Int. J. Ref., 2014, 44: 56.
 
[16] Hong Y.-J.,  Park S.-J.,  Kim H.-B.,Choi Y.-D., "The cool-down characteristics of a miniature Joule–Thomson refrigerator", Cryogenics, 2006, 46: 391.
 
[17] Maytal B., "Cool-down periods similarity for a fast Joule-Thomson cryocooler", Cryogenics, 1992, 32: 653.
 
[18] Chien S. B.,  Chen L. T.,Chou F. C., "A study on the transient characteristics of a self-regulating Joule-Thomson cryocooler", Cryogenics, 1996, 36: 979.
 
[19] Xin R. and Ebadian M., "The effects of Prandtl numbers on local and average convective heat transfer characteristics in helical pipes", J. Heat Transfer, 1997, 119: 467.
Hydrogen, Fuel Cell & Energy Storage
Volume 3, Issue 3 - Serial Number 11
August 2016
Pages 199-212

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics