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    Cooling Tower Evaporation

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    amg007
    The document explains the origin of the cooling tower rule of thumb that for every 10 degree Fahrenheit temperature decrease, 1% of the recirculating water must be evaporated. It shows that this is based on the fact that removing 1,000 BTUs of energy is required to lower the temperature of 100 pounds of water by 10 degrees F, which can be achieved by evaporating 1 pound of water. Therefore, to lower the temperature by 10 degrees F, 1% of the total recirculating water must be evaporated. In practice, the percentage evaporated may be lower, such as 0.75%, with the remainder from sensible cooling effects.

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    Cooling Tower Evaporation

    Uploaded by

    amg007
    90 views2 pages
    The document explains the origin of the cooling tower rule of thumb that for every 10 degree Fahrenheit temperature decrease, 1% of the recirculating water must be evaporated. It shows that this is based on the fact that removing 1,000 BTUs of energy is required to lower the temperature of 100 pounds of water by 10 degrees F, which can be achieved by evaporating 1 pound of water. Therefore, to lower the temperature by 10 degrees F, 1% of the total recirculating water must be evaporated. In practice, the percentage evaporated may be lower, such as 0.75%, with the remainder from sensible cooling effects.

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    The document explains the origin of the cooling tower rule of thumb that for every 10 degree Fahrenheit temperature decrease, 1% of the recirculating water must be evaporated. It shows that this is based on the fact that removing 1,000 BTUs of energy is required to lower the temperature of 100 pounds of water by 10 degrees F, which can be achieved by evaporating 1 pound of water. Therefore, to lower the temperature by 10 degrees F, 1% of the total recirculating water must be evaporated. In practice, the percentage evaporated may be lower, such as 0.75%, with the remainder from sensible cooling effects.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    90 views2 pages

    Cooling Tower Evaporation

    Uploaded by

    amg007
    The document explains the origin of the cooling tower rule of thumb that for every 10 degree Fahrenheit temperature decrease, 1% of the recirculating water must be evaporated. It shows that this is based on the fact that removing 1,000 BTUs of energy is required to lower the temperature of 100 pounds of water by 10 degrees F, which can be achieved by evaporating 1 pound of water. Therefore, to lower the temperature by 10 degrees F, 1% of the total recirculating water must be evaporated. In practice, the percentage evaporated may be lower, such as 0.75%, with the remainder from sensible cooling effects.

    Copyright:

    Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 2

    Cooling Tower Evaporation Rule of Thumb

    By James McDonald, PE, CWT Originally Published: CSTN March 2005

    Youve all heard this rule of thumb: For every T of 10 F, 1% of the


    recirculation rate must be evaporated to achieve this cooling. Where does this rule of thumb come from? It starts with one definition and one fact: A British Thermal Unit (BTU) is defined as the amount of energy it takes to raise 1 pound of water 1 F. Approximately 1,000 BTU of heat is lost from water for every pound of water evaporated.

    Since we are dealing with percentages and to make things simple, lets suppose that we are dealing with 100 pounds of water. If we wanted to cool 100 pounds of water by 1 F, that would mean that we would have to remove 1 BTU of energy from each pound or water. The rule of thumb deals with a 10 F temperature change. To cool 100 pounds of water by 10 F, we would have to remove 10 BTU of energy from each pound of water.
    10 BTU * 100 pounds = 1,000 BTU removed total.

    The above equation shows that to cool 100 pounds of water by 10 F, we have to remove 1,000 BTU. From the second bulleted item above, we know we can do this by evaporating 1 pound of water. 1 pound evaporated / 100 pounds total = 0.01 or 1% Therefore, to cool water by 10 F, you must evaporate 1% of the water. When dealing with a cooling tower, to cool the incoming water being sprayed over the tower by 10 F, then 1% of the flowrate over the tower must be evaporated. This is where the rule of thumb For every T of 10 F, 1% of the recirculation rate must be evaporated to achieve this cooling comes from. All of this is assuming 100% of the cooling is due to evaporation of course. In reality, the seasonal average in your area may be 75% evaporative cooling. This means that for every T of 10 F, 0.75% of the recirculation rate must be evaporated with the rest of the cooling being from sensible cooling. In the
    Calculations 419

    summer, the percent evaporative cooling may be near 100%, and in the wintertime it may be nearer to 0%.

    Calculations

    420

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