Thinking cooling towers typically elicits visions of the giant smokestacks present at nuclear power plants. These giant structures can be up to twenty stories high and are easily the most identifiable forms of cooling towers. However, in practice, cooling towers is a term that actually refers to a much broader range of equipment. They operate across a wide range of industries (not just power production) and come in a variety of shapes and sizes.

In order for towers to effectively cool equipment, they must utilize elements of nature – those of physical laws. This equipment operates through a combination of conduction and convection. Conduction is the process through which heat moves from warmer to colder areas. When one opens the door from a warm house on a cold winter’s day, they are not letting cold air in, but rather warm air out. Convection is the process through which heat is circulated in a controlled (or uncontrolled) manner by continually having higher temperatures replace colder ones. Both of these aspects of physics are used extensively for cooling towers to operate.

In practice, cooling towers simply serve to transfer heat from one area (typically in the production process) to another (say the atmosphere). One common method for these devices is to use water to cool the area, which will evaporate and turn into steam, thus travelling as a gas out of the tower. If the steam is transferred to a safe area in the atmosphere, it will disperse and reach normal temperature levels ceasing to be dangerous. Water typically serves as a much quicker cooling mechanism than air or other common liquids. Overall, the functionality of cooling towers is quite comparable to that of a common automotive radiator. When a radiator begins to overheat, a common solution is to add water to it – this is the same thought process for cooling towers.

Cooling towers need not be stories high or even meters wide. In fact, most forms of industrial air conditioners use a cooling tower in some shape or form. Most HVAC (heating, ventilating, and air conditioning) professionals are very familiar with these types of units. While it almost feels like a professional baseball team could practice in some of the biggest cooling towers, the most common forms are sized anywhere from that of a coffee table to that of a living room. Function is pretty standard across board, with the size of the unit determined more by the volume and temperature of the heat that needs to be removed or transferred.

There are three different ways that most cooling towers operate to transfer heat. The type of devices that use methods described above would be considered wet cooling towers. Fluid is used to cool the device (liquids transfer heat more easily that solids, but maintain it – allowing it to be steered – better than solids) and then evaporates outward in a preset manner. Dry cooling towers are the simplest method for cooling and transfer the heat directly to the exit point through pipes or tubes. Fluid coolers are the most complicated, using a combination of both other methods.

No matter the method, cooling towers are a necessity for any production industry. Wherever heat is necessary, there is also the need to effectively and safely cool it.

Author Bio: By Felix Chesterfield; for more cooling towers data and other equipment information, please contact the author or visit the link.

Category: Business
Keywords: Cooling towers, heat transfer