Title of Paper:Experimental investigation on fluid flow and heat transfer characteristics of a submerged combustion vaporizer

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Date of Publication:2017-02-25

Journal:APPLIED THERMAL ENGINEERING

Included Journals:SCIE、EI

Volume:113

Page Number:529-536

ISSN No.:1359-4311

Key Words:Submerged combustion vaporizer; Trans-critical; Flue gas; Heat transfer; New correlations

Abstract:Submerged combustion vaporizer (SCV) occupies a decisive position in liquefied natural gas (LNG) industrial chain. In this paper, a visual experimental apparatus was established to have a comprehensive knowledge about fluid flow and heat transfer performance of SCV. Trans-critical liquid nitrogen (LN2) was selected as alternative fluid to substitute LNG because of safety reason. Some unique experimental phenomena inside the SCV (local water bath freezes on the external surface of tube bundle) were revealed. Meanwhile the influences of static water height, superficial flue gas velocity, heat load, tube side inlet pressure and tube-side mass flux on the system performance were systematically discussed. Finally, based on the obtained experimental results, two new empirical Nusselt number correlations were regressed to predict the shell-side and tube-side heat transfer characteristics of SCV. The maximum errors between predicted results and experimental data were respectively 25% and 20%. The outcomes of this paper were critical to the optimum design and economical operation of SCV. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.