Determination of the controlling process in coupled heat and mass transfer

The influence of noncondensable gases oil condensation is well known going back to Nusselt. The noncondensables tend to form a blanket around the cooled surface which can significantly slow condensation rates by introducing a controlling mass transfer resistance. The coupled heat and mass transfer process that results has a significant impact on the optimum design of compact condenser bundles. One of the questions that arises in analyzing such a coupled process is which of the two processes is controlling the overall transfer process? One way to quantify a solution to this problem is to take a thermodynamic perspective and to compute the entropy generation associated with each of the individual processes. Then, the process that contributes the largest entropy generation is viewed as the controlling process. The result of such a determination provides insight as to how to augment the overall transfer process. The approach taken in this study is to use available CFD (computational fluid dynamics) codes to formulate and solve the condenser problem to gain insight into the coupled process. The resulting temperature, velocity and concentration data can then be analyzed to determine the entropy generation associated with each of the processes. Results are presented for a series of simplified geometries that define the magnitude of the effects contributed by each of the transfer processes.