Description
The project will consist of modeling the evaporator and condensers of a plate-fin style heat exchanger using graphite foams developed at ORNL. This Modeling will consist of using computational fluid dynamics to simulate the evaporation and condensation of the refrigerant (ammonia) within the foam pores while capturing the complex heat transfer occurring during this phenomena. This will be used to compare the concept of the graphite foam plate-fin designs to the current shell and tube design being considered for such large scale operations as within an Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Plant (OTEC). During this project, Michael will also conduct research in the laboratory fabricating a subscale prototype design and use this to validate the computer models to real data. This subscale design will be compared in a head-to-head fashion with the current state of the art designs.