ANALYSIS OF FORCED DRAFT COOLING TOWER PERFORMANCE USING ANSYS FLUENT SOFTWARE

S. Parimala Murugaveni, P. Mohamed Shameer

Abstract: In this project the cooling tower performance has been analyzed by varying air inlet parameters with different air inlet angles and by attaching a nozzle in air inlet. The cooling tower analyzed here is used specifically for small scale industries, which is forced draft counter-flow cooling tower with single module capacities from 10 to 100 cooling tons. In this project 50 tons cooling capacity model has been taken as reference model. The analysis has been done using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) ANSYS 14.5 software. The cooling tower models have been modeled using SOLIDWORKS 2013 software and they have been meshed using ICEM CFD 14.5 software. The meshed models have been analyzed using FLUENT software. The air inlet angles varied in horizontal direction, vertical direction and by combining both horizontal and vertical inclination. A convergent nozzle has been modeled and assembled to the inlet pipe. The temperature contours of the cooling tower models have been taken from the analysis. Based on the outlet cold water temperature, the improved effectiveness of the cooling tower model has been obtained.

Keywords: Forced draft cooling tower, Air inlet parameter, Convergent nozzle, Cooling ton capacity, Counter flow cooling tower, Ansys 14.5, Solidworks 2013, ICEM CFD 14.5, Effectiveness of cooling tower.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15623/ijret.2015.0404039