Sarkar, J.

: Performance Improvement of Double-Tube Gas Cooler in CO2 …

THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118 109

PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT OF DOUBLE-TUBE GAS COOLER

IN CO2 REFRIGERATION SYSTEM USING NANOFLUIDS
by
Jahar SARKAR*
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, BHU, Varanasi, India
Original scientific paper
DOI: 10.2298/TSCI120702121S

The theoretical analyses of the double-tube gas cooler in transcritical carbon di-
oxide refrigeration cycle have been performed to study the performance im-
provement of gas cooler as well as CO2 cycle using Al2O3, TiO2, CuO, and Cu
nanofluids as coolants. Effects of various operating parameters (nanofluid inlet
temperature and mass flow rate, CO2 pressure and particle volume fraction) are
studied as well. Use of nanofluid as coolant in double-tube gas cooler of CO2 cy-
cle improves the gas cooler effectiveness, cooling capacity, and COP without
penalty of pumping power. The CO2 cycle yields best performance using
Al2O3-H2O as a coolant in double-tube gas cooler followed by TiO2-H2O,
CuO-H2O, and Cu-H2O. The maximum cooling COP improvement of transcritical
CO2 cycle for Al2O3-H2O is 25.4%, whereas that for TiO2-H2O is 23.8%, for CuO-
H2O – 20.2%, and for Cu-H2O – 16.2% for the given ranges of study. Study shows
that the nanofluid may effectively use as coolant in double-tube gas cooler to im-
prove the performance of transcritical CO2 refrigeration cycle.
Key words: transcritical CO2 cycle, double tube gas cooler, nanofluids, heat
transfer, modeling, performance

Introduction
To attain a higher degree of sustainability, natural refrigerants such as ammonia,
carbon dioxide, hydrocarbons, and nitrous oxide do appear more attractive than the other syn-
thetic refrigerants. CO2 is increasingly becoming the refrigerant of choice and have been
widely accepted due to its various advantages including zero ozone depletion potential and
negligible global warming potential. Within the last decade, CO2 has drawn ample interest as
a natural refrigerant in refrigeration, air-conditioning, and heat pump applications [1, 2]. The
double tube heat exchanger have been extensively used as a gas cooler in transcritical CO2
systems for smaller and medium capacity refrigeration and heat pump applications [3-6].
Nanofluid can be used as a coolant in gas cooler to improve the performance of CO2 refrigera-
tion system.
Nanofluids are a new class of nanotechnology-based heat transfer fluids that are en-
gineered by stably suspending a small amount of nanoparticles. Nanofluids consisting of such
particles suspended in liquids (typically conventional heat transfer liquids) have been shown
to enhance the thermal conductivity and convective heat transfer performance of the base liq-
uids. Nanofluids have the potential to reduce such thermal resistances, and various industrial
groups would benefit from such improved heat transfer fluids [7]. Use of nanofluids in double
tube heat exchanger is comparatively more effective [8]. Chun et al. [9] measured heat trans-
––––––––––––––
Author’s e-mail: [email protected]
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110 THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118

fer characteristics of γ-Al2O3/transformer oil nanofluid in a double tube heat exchanger sys-
tem under laminar flow condition and showed significant heat transfer enhancement possibly
due to high concentration of nanoparticles in the thermal boundary layer at the wall side
through the migration of nanoparticles. Experimental studies of pressure drop and convective
heat transfer of TiO2/water nanofluid in a double pipe heat exchanger are reported by
Duangthongsuk et al. [10]. They showed that the convective heat transfer coefficient of
nanofluid is slightly higher than that of the base liquid. Fard et al. [11] numerically and exper-
imentally investigated the heat transfer characteristics of ZnO/water nanofluid in a concentric
tube heat exchanger under laminar flow condition and showed that the heat transfer coeffi-
cient of nanofluid was 14% higher than base fluid. Zamzamian et al. [12] experimentally in-
vestigated forced convective heat transfer coefficient of Al2O3/EG and CuO/EG nanofluids in
a double pipe heat exchanger under turbulent flow. However, any theoretical or experimental
investigation on the use of nanofluid as secondary fluid in refrigeration or heat pump system
is scarce in the open literatures.
In the present work, a nanofluid cooled double tube heat exchanger (gas cooler) has
been modeled and simulated for transcritical CO2 refrigeration system. To take care of highly
variable heat transfer characteristics (due to the sharp variation of CO2 properties near
pseudocritical region), the lengthwise discretization of gas cooler has been incorporated in the
model. Effects of operating pressure and temperature, mass flow rate, nanofluid variety, and
particle volume concentration on the performance have been studied as well.

Theoretical modeling and simulation

The nanofluid (nf) cooled concentric double
tube gas cooler considered in this study has follow-
ing dimensions: inner and outer diameters of inner
tube are 4.75 mm and 6.35 mm, respectively, inner
diameter of outer tube is 10 mm, and tube length is
14 m [5]. The heat exchanger is counter-flow type,
where the nanofluid flows through the inner tube
and the refrigerant flows through the annulus. As
the effect of using nanofluid as a cooling medium
in gas cooler on the cycle performance improve-
ment is the main aim of the present study, only gas
cooler has been modeled. The temperature entropy
diagram of transcritical CO2 refrigeration cycle is
Figure 1. T-s diagram of transcritical CO2 shown in fig. 1 with non-isentropic compression
refrigeration cycle (1-2), gas cooling/heat rejection through double-
tube gas cooler (2-3), isenthalpic expansion (3-4),
and evaporation/heat addition (4-1) to get the useful refrigeration effect.
It may be noted that the CO2 properties variations in gas cooler is very significant
and hence to take care of this, the lengthwise discretization technique has been successfully
applied for gas cooler of double pipe, fin-tube compact heat exchanger as well as shell and
tube types [5, 13, 14] in transcritical CO2 system. In the present study also, to consider the
lengthwise highly property variation, the double tube heat exchanger (gas cooler) has been
discretized and mass, momentum, and energy conservation equations have been applied to
each segment. The following assumptions have been made in the analysis:
– compressor inlet condition is dry-saturated,
Sarkar, J.: Performance Improvement of Double-Tube Gas Cooler in CO2 …
THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118 111

– heat transfer with the ambient is negligi-

ble, and
– only single-phase heat transfer occurs for
nanofluid.
The double tube gas cooler has been
equally divided into number of segments of
length ∆L as shown in fig. 2. Employing log
mean temperature difference expression,
heat transfer in ith segment of the gas cooler
is given by [5]:

(Tri − Tnfi ) − (Tri +1 − Tnfi +1 )

Qi = (UA)i (1)
ln[(Tri − Tnfi ) (Tri +1 − Tnfi +1 )] Figure 2. A computational segment of gas cooler

The overall heat transfer coefficient and

heat transfer area product is determined by the equation [5]:
1 1 ln(d o /di ) 1
= + + (2)
UA Anf α nf 2πkt ∆L Arα r
Additionally, energy balance in ith segment of gas cooler for both the fluids yield [5]:

Qi = m r (hr i − hr i +1 ) = m nf cp,nf (Tnf i − Tnf i +1 ) (3)

For supercritical CO2 cooling in annulus, to take care of large variation of CO2
properties in the radial direction, Pitla et al. [15] proposed a modified correlation incorporat-
ing both bulk and wall properties. This correlation, used for gas cooler model, is given by:
⎛ Nu rb + Nu rt ⎞ krt
Nu r = ⎜ ⎟k (4)
⎝ 2 ⎠ rb
Here, Nurb and Nurt are the Nusselt numbers at bulk and wall temperature, respec-
tively, predicted by Gnielinski equation within the range 2300 < Re < 106 and 0.6 < Pr < 105.
( f /8)(Re − 1000) Pr
Nu = (5)
1.07 + 12.7( f /8)0.5 (Pr 2/3 − 1)
where f is the friction factor given by:
1 4m r
f = , Re = (6)
[0.79ln(Re) − 1.64] 2
π( Di − d o ) µrb
Hence, heat transfer coefficient is given by:
krb
αr = Nu r (7)
de
where the equivalent diameter of annulus side de is given by:

Di2 − d o2
de = (8)
do
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112 THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118

To evaluate the heat transfer coefficient of nanofluid for turbulent flow, Xuan and Li
correlation [16] has been used, which is given by (104 ≤ Renf ≤ 2.5·104, φ ≤ 2%):
α nf di
= 0.0059(1 + 7.6286φ 0.6886 Pe p 0.001 ) Re0.9238
nf Prnf0.4 (9)
knf

The Reynolds number, the Prandtl number, and the particle Peclet number for
nanofluid are defined, respectively, as [14]:
ρ nf um di 4m nf
Renf = = (10)
µnf πdi µnf

cp,nf µnf
Prnf = (11)
knf

ρ nf cp,nf um d p 4m nf cp,nf d p

Pe d = = (12)
knf πdi 2 knf

The effective density and the effective specific heat of the nanofluid can be calculat-
ed from relations [14]:
ρ nf = (1 − φ ) ρ w + φρ p (13)

( ρ cp ) nf = (1 − φ )( ρ cp ) w + φ ( ρ cp ) p (14)

The viscosity of nanofluid has been calculated by Einstein’s equation [14], given by:
µnf = (1 + 2.5φ ) µw (15)

The effective thermal conductivity of the nanofluid has been calculated by Yu and
Choi equation [17], given by ( ≤ 5%):

kp + 2kw + 2(kp − kw )(1 + β )3 φ

knf = kw (16)
kp + 2k w − (kp − k w )(1 + β )3 φ

where β = 0.1 and the temperature dependent transport properties: dynamic viscosity and
thermal conductivity of water are given by [14], respectively (0 ≤ t ≤ 90 °C):

µ w = 0.00157 − 4.68 ⋅ 10−5 t + 5.71 ⋅ 10−7 t 2 − 2.52 ⋅ 10−9 t 3 (17)

kw = 0.5473 + 2.14 ⋅ 10−3 t − 9.6737 ⋅ 10−6 t 2 (18)

The annulus (CO2)-side pressure drop in each segment is predicted by [13]:

8m r 2 ⎛ i ∆L ⎞
pi − pi +1 = ⎜ fr + 1.2 ⎟ (19)
⎝ Di − d o
2
π ( Di2 − d o2 )2 ρ r i ⎠
where the friction factor is given in [13].
The tube side pressure drop is given by [18]:
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THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118 113

i ∆L 8m nf 2
∆pnf = f nf (20)
di π 2 di4 ρ nf i
The friction factor correlation of nanofluid, which has been established for Al2O3,
SiO2, and CuO nanofluids [18], is given by (4000 ≤ Re ≤ 16000, φ ≤ 6%):
0.797 0.108
−0.25 ⎛ ρnf ⎞ ⎛ µnf ⎞
f nf = 0.3164 Renf ⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟ (21)
⎝ ρw ⎠ ⎝ µw ⎠
Assuming 85% pump efficiency [14], the pump work is given by:
m nf ∆pnf
Wp = ∑
0.85 n ρ nf
(22)

The cooling capacity and compressor power, respectively, are given by:
Qe = m r (h1 − h3 ) (23)
Wc = m r (h2 − h1 ) (24)
Finally, the effective system performance using nanofluid is given by:
Qe
COP = (25)
Wc + Wp
Based on previously developed simulation model for CO2 heat pump (validation with
experimental data showed good agreement [5]), a computer code has been developed to simu-
late the double tube heat exchanger (gas cooler) in transcritical CO2 refrigeration system at var-
ious operating conditions. Author’s own developed subroutine ‘CO2PROP’ [5] has been inte-
grated with code to estimate the thermodynamic and transport properties of CO2 in subcritical
as well as supercritical zones. To consider the sharp property variation, the entire length of the
gas cooler has been divided equally into several discrete segments (segment length ∆L = total
length/n) and each segment has been treated as a counter flow heat exchanger. In each segment,
heat transfer coefficients for both refrigerant and nanofluid are calculated based on mean values.
This way, the gas cooler is made equivalent to a number of counter flow heat exchangers ar-
ranged in series and the combined heat transfer of all the segments is the total heat transfer of
the gas cooler. Therefore, fast changing properties of CO2 have been modeled accurately in the
gas cooler. For given evaporator temperature and gas cooler pressure, gas cooler inlet enthalpy
and temperature of CO2 are calculated by assumed 75% compressor efficiency to accommodate
non-isentropic compression. For given, gas cooler geometry, CO2 and nanofluid mass flow rates
and nanofluid properties [14], gas cooler model is used to calculate outlet temperatures and ca-
pacity. It may be noted that the mass flow rates are so selected that the both CO2 and nanofluid
flows will be turbulent with moderate Re. The heat transfer coefficient for pure water has been
calculated by Gnieliniski equation for liquids [14]. The effective iteration technique has been
used in the code to get good accuracy of results. Finally, performance parameters have been
calculated for various input parameters.
Results and discussion
The performances of the double tube gas cooler as well as the CO2 refrigeration cy-
cle are presented for various compressor discharge pressures (90 to 110 bar), nanofluid mass
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114 THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118

flow rates (0.015 to 0.05 kg/s) and nanoparticle volume fraction in nanofluid (0.1 to 2%). Un-
less otherwise stated the mean values are refrigerant pressure at gas cooler inlet of 100 bar,
nanofluid mass flow rate of 0.03 kg/s, and nano-particle volume concentration of 1%. The
CO2 temperature in evaporator, CO2 mass flow rate and nanofluid inlet temperature to gas
cooler have been taken as 5 °C, 0.02 kg/s, and 30 °C, respectively. The nanoparticle diameter
is taken as 50 nm. The heat exchanger (gas cooler) effectiveness and cooling COP are suita-
bly plotted to illustrate the various performance trends.
The grid dependent test results show that with the
increase in number of segments, the result initially
changes rapidly and then slowly merges to same val-
ue and that has been happened approximately after
15 number of segments. Hence the number of seg-
ment has been taken as 20 for simulation, where re-
sult becomes nearly independent on number of seg-
ments (e. g. error in COP is less than 0.1% per seg-
ment). For example, the lengthwise variations of CO2
and nanofluid temperatures, and overall heat transfer
coefficient are shown in fig. 3 for mean operating
conditions with alumina-water nanofluid, which
Figure 3. Lengthwise variations of
temperatures and conductance
shows the significant variation of overall heat trans-
fer coefficient and the maximum value is at the
pseudocritical temperature and confirms to need of
discretization, and also the grid dependent variation
is shown in fig. 4. Hence, similar to previous studies
[5, 13, 14], the discretization has been effectively used
in gas cooler to get the better accuracy of results.
The performance comparison of double-tube
gas cooler with four nanofluids: alumina-water
(Al2O3-H2O), titanium dioxide-water (TiO2-H2O),
copper oxide-water (CuO-H2O), and copper-water
(Cu-H2O) as coolant is shown in tab. 1 for mean op-
erating conditions. Results show that the heat transfer
in double-tube gas cooler increases by using nanoflu-
Figure 4. Grid dependent test id due to increase in heat transfer properties (overall
heat transfer coefficient) and hence the effectiveness
of gas cooler also increases. As a result, the cooling capacity increases due to decrease in CO2
exit temperature in gas cooler. It may be noted that the density, viscosity, and thermal conduc-
tivity increases and specific heat capacity decreases by using nanoparticle, and hence both Re
and Pr decreases for same mass flow rate. However, the heat transfer coefficient increases
compared to base fluid due to increase in thermal conductivity and probably improvement of
heat transport properties due to several slip mechanisms of nanofluids. Pressure drops by us-
ing nanofluids are similar to that of pure water as a coolant in gas cooler, which agreed with
the experimental results with nanofluid [16]. However, the pump work decreases slightly with
the use of nanoparticle in water due to increase in fluid density. As a result, the cooling COP
of CO2 cycle improves by using nanofluid as coolant in double-tube gas cooler. It may be
noted that the specific heat for alumina nanofluid is maximum and the thermal conductivity
for Cu nanofluid is maximum and as a result, Pr and Pe are maximum for alumina nanofluid
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THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118 115

for same particle Table 1. Performance comparison (p2 = 100 bar, m nf = 0.03 kg/s, φ = 1%)
volume concen- Parameters Al2O3 TiO2 CuO Cu
tration, and ulti-
Discharge temperature, [oC] 82.3 82.3 82.3 82.3
mately, Nusselt
number and heat Gas cooler CO2 exit temperature, [°C] 40.38 40.45 40.61 40.82
transfer coeffici- Nanofluid outlet temperature, [°C] 56.20 56.28 56.65 56.98
ent are maximum Nanofluid pressure drop, [bar] 1.2720 1.2705 1.2654 1.2562
for alumina nano- Cooling capacity, [W] 2245.7 2239.9 2217.7 2192.0
fluid. Hence, as Compressor work, [W] 950.4 950.4 950.4 950.4
shown in tab. 1, Pump work, [W] 4.371 4.347 4.227 4.108
the increase in Increase in pump work, [%] –1.5 –2.0 –4.0 –6.5
heat rejection and Heat rejection in gas cooler, [W] 3196.2 3190.3 3168.1 3142.5
effectiveness are Increase in heat rejection, [%] 3.3 3.2 2.9 2.5
maximum for
Gas cooler effectiveness, [%] 80.16 80.07 79.71 79.30
alumina followed
by TiO2, CuO, Increase in effectiveness 0.67 0.64 0.55 0.45
and Cu nanoflu- Cooling COP 2.3521 2.3460 2.3230 2.2965
ids. On the other COP improvement, [%] 4.36 4.16 3.66 3.03
hand, the pressure
drop and pumping power are maximal for alumina nanofluid. The cooling COP is maximal
for alumina followed by TiO2, CuO, and Cu nanofluids for same operating conditions.
The variations of double tube gas cooler effectiveness and cooling COP with com-
pressor discharge pressure are shown in figs. 5 and 6, respectively, using studied nanofluids.
The CO2 inlet temperature increases with increase in compressor discharge pressure and hence,
the heat rejection in gas cooler increases due to increase in effective heat transfer temperature
difference. Whereas, the effectiveness of gas cooler decreases with increase in CO2 pressure due
to degradation of heat transfer properties as go away from critical pressure. However, due to
distinct cycle behavior of transcritical CO2 cycle [5], the cooling COP of the cycle increases
with increase in CO2 inlet pressure to gas cooler. As the compressor discharge pressure has no
effect on nanofluid heat transfer or flow properties, the performance deviations with all four
nanofluids are independent on the CO2 inlet pressure to gas cooler as shown in figures.
The variations of double tube gas cooler effectiveness and cooling COP with
nanofluid mass flow rate are shown in figs. 7 and 8, respectively, using studied nanofluids.

Figure 5. Variation of gas cooler effectiveness Figure 6. Variation of cooling COP with
with compressor discharge pressure compressor discharge pressure
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116 THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118

Figure 7. Variation of gas cooler effectiveness Figure 8. Variation of cooling COP with
with nanofluid mass flow rate nanofluid mass flow rate

The nanofluid heat transfer coefficient increases with increase in nanofluid mass flow rate due
to increase in Reynolds number, and hence overall heat transfer coefficient increases resulting
in increase in gas cooler effectiveness. The cooling capacity increases due to increase in gas
cooler effectiveness and mass flow rate. The compressor work remain unchanged and the
pumping power increases significantly with increase in mass flow rate, however, negligibly
small compared to compressor work. Hence, the cooling COP of the cycle increases with in-
crease in nanofluid mass flow rate. As the nanofluid properties are independent on nanofluid
mass flow rate, the effect on performance deviations with all four nanofluids is negligible.
The variations of double tube gas cooler effectiveness and cooling COP with parti-
cle volume fraction are shown in figs. 9 and 10, respectively, using studied nanofluids. The
specific heat capacity decreases and viscosity increases, whereas the thermal conductivity in-
creases initially rapidly and then slowly, and hence the heat transfer coefficient initially in-
creases rapidly and then negligibly with increase in particle volume fraction. As a result, the
effectiveness of gas cooler and cooling capacity increases with increase in volume fraction.
The pressure drop increases but pumping power decreases negligibly with increase in volume
fraction due to increase in density. Hence, the cooling COP increases rapidly and then slowly
with increase in volume fraction. The deviation of nanofluid properties increases and hence
the deviation of COP values increases with increase in volume fraction. Study shows that the
particle volume fraction may be optimize based on cooling COP, however, the higher opti-
mum volume fraction will cause more stability problem of nanofluid.

Figure 9. Variation of gas cooler effectiveness Figure 10. Variation of cooling COP with
with particle volume fraction particle volume fraction
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THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118 117

The improvement of performance has be ob-

served for CO2 cycle by using nanofluid as a coolant
instead of water in double tube gas cooler and the im-
provement is dependent on nanofluids kind as well as
operating conditions. Figure 11 predicts the percentage
of cooling COP improvements using nanofluid com-
pared to water for various operating conditions. The
percentage of improvement is also dependent on abso-
lute value. For the given ranges of study, the maximum
cooling COP improvement of transcritical CO2 cycle
for Al2O3-H2O is observed as 25.4%, whereas that for
TiO2-H2O is 23,8%, for CuO-H2O – 20.2%, and for Figure 11. Comparison of COP
Cu-H2O – 16.2%. It may be noted that the large devia- improvements
tion between various correlations for nanofluid heat
transfer coefficient has been observed [19], which leads to performance deviation. Interestingly,
system performance will be obviously improved without extra pump power by using nanofluids.
Conclusions
The nanofluid cooled double tube gas cooler has been modeled and simulated for
transcritical CO2 refrigeration system to study the effects of various operating parameters on
system performance improvement. From the results and discussion, the following conclusion
can be made.
● Use of nanofluid as coolant in double-tube gas cooler improves the gas cooler effective-
ness, cooling capacity, and COP without penalty of pumping.
● The CO2 system yields best performance using Al2O3-H2O as coolant in double-tube gas
cooler followed by TiO2-H2O, CuO-H2O, and Cu-H2O.
● The performance variation shows the similar trends with respect to gas cooler inlet pres-
sure and nanofluid mass flow rates for all nanofluids, however, the performance devia-
tion increases with increase in particle volume fraction.
● The cooling COP increases with increase in compressor discharge pressure, nanofluid
mass flow rate and particle volume fraction.
● The maximum cooling COP improvement of transcritical CO2 cycle for Al2O3-H2O is
25.4%, whereas that for TiO2-H2O is 23.8%, for CuO-H2O – 20.2%, and for Cu-H2O –
16.2% for the given ranges of study.
Nomenclature
A – heat transfer area, [m2] Q – heat transfer rate, [W]
cp – specific heat capacity, [kJkg–1K–1] Re – Reynolds number, [–]
d, D – inner and outer tube diameter, [m] t, T – temperature, [°C, K]
f – friction factor, [–] U – overall heat transfer coefficient, [Wm–2K–1]
h – specific enthalpy, [kJkg–1] um – mean velocity, [ms–1]
k – thermal conductivity, [Wm–1K–1] W – work transfer, [W]
∆L – segmented length, [m]
Greek symbols
m – mass flow rate, [kgs–1]
n – number of segments, [–] α – heat transfer coefficient, [Wm–2K–1]
Nu – Nusselt number, [–] µ – dynamic viscosity, [Nsm–2]
p – pressure, [bar] ρ – fluid density, [kgm–3]
Pe – Peclet number, [–] φ – particle volume fraction, [–]
Pr – Prandtl number, [–]
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118 THERMAL SCIENCE, Year 2015, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp. 109-118

Subscripts o – outer
p – nanoparticle, pump
b – bulk property
r – refrigerant
c – compressor
t – tube, tube wall
i – inner
w – water
nf – nanofluid

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Paper submitted: February 7, 2012

Paper revised: March 16, 2013
Paper accepted: September 14, 2013