Duhok Polytechnic University

College of Technical Engineering

Department of Petrochemical

Thermodynamic Lab

COOLING TOWER

By: Mohammad Ihsan Karam

Group: B
Experiment #5
 COOLING TOWER
OBJECTIVE
To study the operation of the cooling tower, and applying “Energy and
Mass” balance.

INTRODUCTION
The cooling tower is one of the most important device in industrial
applications for example when the hot water come from heat exchanger we
use the cooling tower to cool it.
The purpose of cooling tower is to cool relatively warm water by contacting
with unsaturated air. The evaporation of water mainly provides cooling.
In a typical water cooling water tower, warm water flows countercurrent to
an air stream. Typically, the warm water enters the top of packed tower and
cascades down through the packing, leaving at the bottom.
Air enters at the bottom of the tower and flows upward through the
descending water. The tower packing often consists of slats of plastic or of
packed bed. The water is distributed by troughs and overflows to cascade
over slat gratings or packing that provides large interfacial areas of contact
between the water and air in the form of droplets and films of water. The
flow of air upward through the tower can be induced by the buoyancy of the
warm air in the tower (natural draft) or by the action of a fan.
The water cannot be cooled below the wet bulb temperature. The driving
force for the evaporation of the water is approximately the vapor pressure of
the water less the vapor pressure it would have at the wet bulb temperature.

APPARATUS

• Air distribution chamber. • A make-up tank.

• A centrifugal fan with intake damper.

• Pump.

• A water collecting basin.

• An electrical control panel.

• Packed column.

• Column cap.

• Temperature indicator.

• Inclined tube manometer.

• Variable area flow meter.

• A tank with heaters to simulate cooling loads of 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5 kW.

•
THEORY

Cooling Load: The rate at which heat is removed from the water. Make-up;
- The quantity of fresh water which must be supplied to the water circuit to
make up the losses due to evaporation and other causes.

Cooling Range: The difference between the water temperature at the entry
and exit from the tower.

Approach to wet Bulb: The difference between the temperature of the

water leaving the tower and the wet bulb temperature of the air entering.

In a cooling tower with an adequate air flow, the water leaving a cooling
tower and the local wet bulb temperature is an indication of the effectiveness
of the cooling tower.

For this reason, the difference between the temperature of the water leaving
a cooling tower and the local wet bulb temperature is an indication of the
effectiveness of the cooling tower.

The “Approach to Wet Bulb” is one the important parameters in the testing,
specification, design and selection of cooling towers.

Cooling Tower Performance:

The following factors affected the performance of a cooling tower:

• The air flow rate.

• The water flow rate.
• The water temperature.
• The air temperature and humidity at inlet (particularly the wet bulb
temperature).
• The type of packing used.
• The area and volume of the packing.
PROCEDURE

1.Start the fan.

2. Start water pump and adjust the flow rate to a desired value.

3. Start the water heater and set the inlet temperature to a desired value.

4. Wait till the steady state is obtained.

5. Measure air wet bulb temperature and dry bulb temperature at the inlet
and outlet of the cooling tower.

6. Measure the pressure difference in manometer (x).

7. Calculate the results as shown in the table below using data.

RESULT

The following results will be obtained:

Discussion

1. What is the purpose of the cooling tower?

 Cooling towers are heat rejection devices used to transfer

process waste heat to atmosphere. Cooling towers may either
use the evaporation of water to reject process heat and cool the
working fluid to near the wet bulb air temperature on air to cool
working fluid to near dry bulb air temperature.

2. What are the parameters effect to performance of cooling

water?

 Once a cooling tower is designed and built, its performance are

influenced mainly by wet bulb temperature of the moist air
entering the tower and the ratio of water and air mass flow rate
(L/G ratio). The question is what happens at water flow rate at
part load since the tower.

3. What is the effect of increasing the temperature of the inlet air

on the performance of the cooling water?

 The goal of this article is to debunk a few misconceptions, and

show how inlet air temperature actually affects compressor
efficiency in three kinds of systems. ... Two-stage, oil-free
compressors with inter-cooling have good efficiency, but they
behave like “adiabatic” compressors as far as the inlet
temperature is concerned.

4. How you can determine the cooling water efficiency?

 Cooling tower use evaporative cooling to reduce the
temperature of circulated water, and. they can achieve water
temperatures below the dry bulb temperature - tdb - of the
cooling air; they are in general smaller and cheaper for the
same cooling loads than other cooling systems.