An experimental investigation of the evaporation of cryogenic-liquid-pool spreading on concrete ground

Abstract

Cryogenic liquids have been used in various industries for decades. A component of hazard assessments during their usage is evaluation of the evaporation of a liquid pool, which has been extensively studied. However, the evaporation velocity, i.e., the volumetric evaporation rate per unit area, for a spreading pool has not been well investigated. An attempt was made to address this gap. The measurement method of the evaporation velocity for a spreading pool is described in the authors’ previous work. In the present work, a cryogenic liquid was spilled with a finite flow rate onto unbounded ground to assess the effect of the spill rate on the evaporation velocity for the radially spreading pool. It was experimentally found that a greater spill rate resulted in a higher evaporation velocity. In addition, the measured evaporation velocity was compared to the results obtained from the unsteady one-dimensional heat conduction model. The theoretical and measured results were in good agreement. Furthermore, a formula for the evaporation velocity of the spreading pool was derived, for the first time, based on experimental data.