Heat and mass transfer in a contaminated porous concrete slab with variable dielectric properties

Abstract

The effect of temperature dependent dielectric properties on concrete decontamination and decommissioning using microwave technology is investigated theoretically in this paper. The concrete is treated as a porous material, which has residual water and air within the pores. A one-dimensional model of unsteady heat and mass transport in the porous concrete with temperature dependent dielectric properties is developed. Based on this model, temperature and pressure with different microwave frequencies are predicted, the effects of the temperature dependent dielectric properties on microwave power dissipation, the temperature and pressure distributions for different microwave frequencies, and the different microwave power intensities are analyzed in detail. Four available industrial microwave frequencies of 0.896, 2.45, 10.6 and 18.0 GHz are used in the analysis. As a result of the dielectric properties varying with temperature, the power dissipation also varies with the heating times. Comparing the results for both temperature dependent and constant dielectric properties reveals that the variation of dielectric permittivity with temperature must be considered in a theoretical model of the concrete decontamination and decommissioning process for a low microwave frequency ( f< 2.45 GHz).