Modeling and calculation of process of heat and mass transfer in cooling towers of circulating cooling systems of TPP and NPP

The priority of the state energy policy of the Russian Federation is introduction of resource- and energy-saving technologies. One of the areas to improve such technologies at thermal power plants and nuclear power plants is the effective cooling of circulating water in recirculating cooling systems. Despite the large number of scientific papers on this issue, improving the process of cooling the circulating water of recirculating cooling systems remains an urgent task especially when using cooling tower systems under the conditions of a limited amount of make-up low-mineralized water. There are no universal methods to calculate and design such equipment. Thus, the development of new methods to model and improve heat and mass transfer processes in tower-type cooling towers is an urgent task for the energy sector and related industries. Models based on the mass and energy balance equations are used to solve the problem of modeling heat and mass transfer processes considering the phase transition in coolants. Mathematical programming methods are used to solve the obtained equations. A model of the process of heat and mass transfer in cooling towers of recirculating cooling systems of TPPs and NPPs has been developed, considering a possible phase transition in coolants. An approach and method to solve the problem of choosing the design and operation modes of tower-type cooling towers is proposed. The simulation results are compared with standard data. Comparison of the calculated and experimental results has proved an adequate description of the real process of heat and mass transfer in the cooling tower using the model. It makes possible to set and solve problems to choose the optimal design and operating parameters of the recirculating cooling systems equipment. The proposed method to solve the problem of modeling heat and mass transfer provides the possibility of simultaneously searching for the most acceptable values of operating parameters and design characteristics of tower-type cooling towers for various purposes.