Method and system for simulating heat and mass transfer in cooling towers

摘要

The present invention is a system and method for simulating the performance of a cooling tower. More precisely, the simulator of the present invention predicts values related to the heat and mass transfer from a liquid (e.g., water) to a gas (e.g., air) when provided with input data related to a cooling tower design. In particular, the simulator accepts input data regarding: (a) cooling tower site environmental characteristics; (b) cooling tower operational characteristics; and (c) geometric characteristics of the packing used to increase the surface area within the cooling tower upon which the heat and mass transfer interactions occur. In providing such performance predictions, the simulator performs computations related to the physics of heat and mass transfer within the packing. Thus, instead of relying solely on trial and error wherein various packing geometries are tested during construction of the cooling tower, the packing geometries for a proposed cooling tower can be simulated for use in selecting a desired packing geometry for the cooling tower.