Numerical investigation of effective parameters of falling film evaporation in a vertical‐tube evaporator

Abstract

AbstractWastewater treatment is one of the most effective solutions to manage the problem of water scarcity. Falling film evaporators are excellent technology in wastewater treatment plants. These wastewater evaporators provide high heat transfer, short residence time in the heating zone, and high‐purity distilled water. In the present study, the mechanism of turbulent falling film evaporation in a vertical tube has been investigated. A model has been developed for symmetrical two‐dimensional pure and saline water flow in a vertical tube under constant wall heat flux. The numerical simulation has been carried out by a commercial computational fluid dynamics code. The evaporation of saturated liquid film is simulated utilizing a two‐phase volume of fluid method and Tanasawa phase‐change model. The main objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of water salinity, liquid Reynolds number, wall heat flux, and liquid film thickness on the two‐phase heat transfer coefficient and vapor volume fraction. The numerical heat transfer coefficients are compared with the obtained results by Chen's empirical correlation. With a MAPE ≤ 11%, this study proves that the numerical method is highly effective at predicting the heat transfer coefficient. Moreover, the empirical coefficient of the Tanasawa model and the minimum thickness of the falling film are determined.