Abstract
In their application to air-cooled condensers, axial fans are often subject to the detrimental influence of ambient flow fields at their inlet or outlet. While effects have been investigated mostly under perpendicular cross-flow conditions on fans operating as part of an array in their target design point, this study aims at examining the integral influence of uniform ambient flow fields on a single axial fan over a wide operating range. For this purpose, a wind tunnel fan test rig has been designed and assessed. Multiple angles between uniform ambient flow field and fan axis are examined in their integral influence on the characteristic curve of two distinct industrial axial fans with varying inlet modifications. Increasingly with the fan flow rate, perpendicular inlet cross-flow was found to always have a detrimental influence on fan performance. The straight bladed fan reacted less sensitively than the forward skewed fan, and the adverse cross-flow influence could be reduced with an inlet guard grille and with short conical shroud extensions. Cross-flow at the fan outlet showed potential static fan pressure increases at low flow rates.
Highlights
With rising global energy demands and a growing use of solar power around the globe, thermal power plants are increasingly built in arid locations
While effects have been investigated mostly under perpendicular cross-flow conditions on fans operating as part of an array in their target design point, this study aims at examining the integral influence of uniform ambient flow fields on a single axial fan over a wide operating range
Owen and Kroger computed a reduction of the overall air-cooled condensers (ACC) cooling flow rate of over 15% at 8 m/s wind velocities, which increased the steam turbine backpressure by over 20% [7], which signifies a serious reduction of total plant power generation
Summary
With rising global energy demands and a growing use of solar power around the globe, thermal power plants are increasingly built in arid locations. It has been shown that flow detachment at the periphery of the ACC banks is caused by cross-flow under the platform, which is induced by the center fans’ intake and natural ambient winds [8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16] This reduces volumetric effectiveness of the cooling fans of down to 70% at the ACC perimeter [6, 15, 17,18,19,20,21,22]
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