Numerical Study on Conjugate Heat and Mass Transfer Characteristics Around Thermosolutal Exchangers: Effect of Flow Parameters and Solid Block Arrangement

Abstract

The effect of airflow characteristics within a slot-ventilated enclosure is carried out numerically to optimize the heat and contaminants’ removal rate where cold air is injected via an inlet port. The contaminated air is expelled by the chimney outlet port positioned along the left side of the top wall. Based on the structure dynamics, the flow governing equation is dealt with the Navier–Stokes equations coupled with the energy equation, where the maximum cooling efficiency is evaluated. A finite volume-based semi-implicit method for pressure-linked equations (SIMPLEs) method is utilized to deal with the nonlinear coupled partial differential equations to evaluate the flow variation with changing various physical parameters. Different thermosolutal block orientations are considered to investigate the effective interpretation of heat and mass transfer in a natural chamber. The effects of the inclination angle of the chimney, Richardson and Reynolds numbers on the average heat and mass transfer rate, average temperature, average Bejan number, and performance evaluation criterion (PEC) inside the system are evaluated. Boundary layer analysis is performed to examine the transient behavior of the boundary layer flow dominated by natural convection near the wall heater on the enclosure’s left wall and results are found to agree with our numerical results.