US3327495A - Gas cooling system - Google Patents

Gas cooling system Download PDF

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Publication number
US3327495A
US3327495A US513003A US51300365A US3327495A US 3327495 A US3327495 A US 3327495A US 513003 A US513003 A US 513003A US 51300365 A US51300365 A US 51300365A US 3327495 A US3327495 A US 3327495A
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Prior art keywords
load
gas
cooling
heat
compressor
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Expired - Lifetime
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US513003A
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English (en)
Inventor
Ergenc Sahabettin
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Sulzer AG
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Sulzer AG
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    • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
    • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
    • F25B—REFRIGERATION MACHINES, PLANTS OR SYSTEMS; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS
    • F25B9/00—Compression machines, plants or systems, in which the refrigerant is air or other gas of low boiling point
    • F—MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; LIGHTING; HEATING; WEAPONS; BLASTING
    • F25—REFRIGERATION OR COOLING; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS; MANUFACTURE OR STORAGE OF ICE; LIQUEFACTION SOLIDIFICATION OF GASES
    • F25B—REFRIGERATION MACHINES, PLANTS OR SYSTEMS; COMBINED HEATING AND REFRIGERATION SYSTEMS; HEAT PUMP SYSTEMS
    • F25B9/00—Compression machines, plants or systems, in which the refrigerant is air or other gas of low boiling point
    • F25B9/06—Compression machines, plants or systems, in which the refrigerant is air or other gas of low boiling point using expanders

Definitions

  • the present invention pertains to a gas cooling or refrigeration system in whose coolant circuit there circulates as the refrigerant or cooling medium a gas of low liquefaction temperature which is difficult to liquefy. This gas is compressed and is thereafter cooled, partly by heat exchange and partly by expansion with performance of external work, and it extracts heat by heat exchange from a cooling load, i.e. from a body or system to be maintained at low temperature.
  • the elements of the cooling system of the invention comprise essentially a compressor, one or more heat exchangers, and at least one expansion machine for the expansion of gas.
  • the expansion machine may be of either the turbine or piston type.
  • gases which are difiicult to liquefy and which are useful in the invention are those which under normal conditions, i.e. at 0 C. and 1 atmosphere absolute pressure, behave substantially like ideal gases and which therefore substantially conform under those conditions to the ideal gas laws.
  • gases include, for example, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, and also the noble gases such as helium, neon, etc.
  • the cooling load which takes the form of a heat exchanger, must be made small for reasons of space economy. Consequently, the cooling medium must be delivered to that load through one or more conduits of long length and small cross-section. Additionally it may be necessary, in order to eifect good heat exchange, to provide a large heat exchange surface in the form of a tube or circulating channel having a long length and a small cross-section through which the cooling medium will flow for absorption of heat from the load.
  • Such a construction for the load heat exchanger produces however a large resistance to flow, so that large pressure drops occur in that exchanger.
  • the ratio of output to input pressures at the compressor must be raised, which in turn signifies increased energy consumption by the compressor and may increase the constructional cost of the apparatus.
  • a gas cooling or refrigeration system is so constructed that the cooling medium, after passing through a cooling load, is cooled to the lowest temperature of its cycle by expansion with performance of external work in at least one expansion machine.
  • a gas cooling system according to the invention can be employed, for example, for the cooling of electromagnets. Since the electrical resistance of a conductor declines with falling temperature, it has been proposed to cool the energizing coils of electro-magnets down into the region of extremely low temperatures.
  • the invention makes it possible to cool the coils of such magnets in an advantageous manner by constructing the conductors as hollow tubes and by circulating through those tubes a gas cooled to very low temperature. Since the cross-section of these tubes is small and since the path length therethrough is large, the result is a large pressure drop.
  • the somewhat smaller cooling effect produced by the expansion machine, which operates in the invention at a somewhat lower mean temperature than in the conventional systems above described, is of little consequence.
  • the amount by which the mean temperature of the expansion machine is lowered in the system of the invention, by comparison with the prior art systems, corresponds approximately to the temperature difference at the cold end of the exchanger into which the expanded cooling medium enters.
  • the pressure ratio at the work performing expansion effected after exit of the cooling medium from the coolant load i.e.
  • the ratio of pressure before to pressure after that expansion must be raised in the system of the invention, in order to compensate for the slightly reduced cooling effect on the gas of a given expansion at lowered temperature, but this results in an increase in the required compressor power which is far smaller than the reduction therein achieved by the invention.
  • the means temperature of the cooling medium during its expansion with performance of external work can be raised (with beneficial results on the cooling effect of that expansion) by passing the cooling medium, before its entry into the load, in heat exchange relation successively with cooling medium passing from the load to the expansion machine and with expanded cooling medium passing from the expansion machine toward the compressor.
  • each of these heat exchange steps is operative to lower the temperature of the medium flowing toward the load.
  • the expansion machines employed may advantageously be turbines.
  • FIG. 1 shows one embodiment of a cooling system according to the invention
  • FIGS. 2-5 show variant systems also according to the invention.
  • the cooling system of the invention which may employ helium as the cooling medium, comprises a piston-type compressor 1, a cooler 2 for dissipation or extraction of the heat of compression, a heat exchanger 3, a heat exchanger 4 for absorption of heat from the load to be cooled, and one or more expansion turbines 5 which is plural may comprise several turbines in series.
  • the mode of operation of the system of FIG. 1 is as follows:
  • the cooling medium fed into the system through a conduit not shown, is compressed in compressor 1.
  • the heat of compression is removed from the cooling medium in a cooler 2, which exhausts heat to a sink not shown.
  • the cooling medium is then lowered in temperature to the level desired for its introduction into the load (shown as a heat exchanger 4), by heat exchange in the heat exchanger 3, where it flows countercurrent with cooling medium at low pressure and temperature discharged from the expansion turbine 5 downstream of load 4.
  • the cooling medium effects the desired cooling, e.g. by absorbing heat from a material in that load, and is thereby raised in temperature.
  • the cooling medium is then expanded in the expansion turbine 5.
  • this turbine serves for generation of the cooling capacity employed in the load, and also to cover the thermodynamic losses in the heat exchanger 3.
  • the cooling medium In its expansion in the turbine 5 the cooling medium is cooled down to the lowest temperature in its complete circuit. From turbine 5 the cooling medium flows into the heat exchanger 3 where it is warmed, extracting heat from the medium flowing from cooler 2 toward load 4-, and fiows thence up to the suction side of thecompressor.
  • thermodynamic losses there may be advantageously employed, in place of a single heat exchanger 3, two exchangers in series.
  • the exchanger immediately upstream of the cooling load i.e. nearer the load 4 will have for both of its countercurrent flow passages or systems smaller flow cross-sections than will the exchanger farther from that load, and which exchanger operates in a higher range of temperatures.
  • the system of FIG. 2 includes additional heat exchangers 6 and 7 in the flow circuit of the working fluid.
  • the gaseous working fluid which again may be helium for example, after cooling in the exchanger 3 and before passing through the load 4, is cooled by heat exchange with gaseous medium emerging from the load and before expansion of that gas. This heat exchange takes place in the exchanger 6.
  • the gaseous cooling medium or working fluid flowing toward the load is then further cooled in exchanger 7 with a medium which has been expanded in the turbine 5.
  • the average temperature of the, expansion turbine 5 is somewhat raised so that with the same pressure ratio on that turbine, the cooling effect produced by the turbine is greater in FIG. 2 than in FIG. 1.
  • the cross-sections of the conduits for the cooling medium are larger in the heat exchanger 6 than in the heat exchanger 7.
  • FIG. 3 shows for essentially the same mode of operation a variant on the construction of FIG. 2.
  • a single heat exchanger 10 After the cooling medium at high pres sure is cooled in coil 8 of exchanger 10 by heat exchange with gas at low pressure in coil 16 thereof returning from turbine 5 to the compressor, the medium is passed through a heat exchanger 9 corresponding to the exchanger 6 of FIG. 2. In this exchanger 9 it flows countercurrent to the cooling medium emerging from the load 4. Thereafter the cooling medium returns to the heat exchanger 10 for further cooling in coil 11 thereof (by heat exchange with coil 16) to the desired inlet temperature into the load.
  • FIGS. 4 and 5 show embodiments substantially con-v forming to that of FIG. 3.
  • an expansion turbine 13 (FIG. 4) and a cooler 14 (FIG. 5) respectively.
  • the temperature of the load 4 is lower than the temperature of liquid nitrogen.
  • the noncirculating coolant is partly vaporized and the vapor so produced is conducted through coil 15 in order to cool the gas at high pressure in the heat exchanger 12, flowing from cooler 2 towards the load, before being removed from the system.
  • this expansion is effected downstream of the load, between the load and the compressor in the sense of flow of the Working fluid around the cycle, and the working fluid chilled by this expansion is employed as the cooling agent in a heat exchanger to cool working fluid which has been compressed (and which has been freed of its heat of compression), prior to entry of such working fluid into the load.
  • the invention thus provides a gas cooling system, i.e. a cooling or refrigerating system, in which the working fluid is at all points of its cycle in the gaseous phase.
  • the gas cooling system of the invention as shown for example in FIG. 1, comprises a compressor 1, a cooler 2, a load 4, and an expansion machine 5, and it also comprises conduit means which connect those elements of structure into a closed cycle for flow of the gaseous working fluid from the compressor to the cooler, thence to the load, thence to the expansion machine, and thence back to the compressor.
  • These conduit means moreover provide for delivery of heat by heat exchange, as in the exchanger 3 of FIG. 1, from compressed gas flowing between the cooler and load to expanded gas flowing between the expansion machine and compressor.
  • conduit means additionally provide for flow of heat exchange, as in the exchanger 6 of FIG. 2, from gas flowing between the cooler and load (and downstream of the exchanger 3) to gas flowing between the load 4 and expansion machine 5, and also for flow of heat by heat exchange, as in the exchanger 7 of FIG. 2, from gas flowing between the cooler and load (and downstream of the exchanger 6 of FIG. 2)
  • the interposition of the exchanger 7 between the exchanger 6 and the load makes it possible for each of those exchangers to lower the temperature of the cooling medium flowing therethrough toward the load, and the provision of those exchangers (more especially of the exchanger 6) raises the average temperature of the cooling medium in the turbine 5.
  • FIGS. 4 and 5 are similar to that of FIG. 3.
  • a gas cooling system comprising a compressor, a load, an expansion machine, first and second heat exchangers, each of said exchangers including two channels in heat exchange relation, and conduit means connecting the compressor, machine, heat exchangers and load into a closed cycle for flow of gas from the compressor to one channel of the first heat exchanger, to one channel of the second heat exchanger, to the load, to the other channel of the first heat exchanger, to the machine, to the other channel of the second heat exchanger, and back to the compressor.
  • a gas cooling system according to claim 1 including plural series-connected expansion machines.

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  • Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
  • Physics & Mathematics (AREA)
  • Mechanical Engineering (AREA)
  • Thermal Sciences (AREA)
  • General Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
  • Separation By Low-Temperature Treatments (AREA)
US513003A 1964-12-15 1965-12-10 Gas cooling system Expired - Lifetime US3327495A (en)

Applications Claiming Priority (1)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
CH1618764A CH425848A (de) 1964-12-15 1964-12-15 Gaskälteanlage

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US3327495A true US3327495A (en) 1967-06-27

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US513003A Expired - Lifetime US3327495A (en) 1964-12-15 1965-12-10 Gas cooling system

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US (1) US3327495A (de)
CH (1) CH425848A (de)
FR (1) FR1457885A (de)
GB (1) GB1057507A (de)
NL (1) NL6500777A (de)

Cited By (10)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3494145A (en) * 1968-06-10 1970-02-10 Worthington Corp Integral turbo compressor-expander system for refrigeration
US4106304A (en) * 1976-07-26 1978-08-15 Michael Eskeli Thermodynamic compressor
US4178766A (en) * 1976-07-26 1979-12-18 Michael Eskeli Thermodynamic compressor method
US4420941A (en) * 1983-05-10 1983-12-20 Demos Papastavros Cooling system
US4444024A (en) * 1981-08-04 1984-04-24 Mcfee Richard Dual open cycle heat pump and engine
US4936109A (en) * 1986-10-06 1990-06-26 Columbia Energy Storage, Inc. System and method for reducing gas compressor energy requirements
US6401463B1 (en) 2000-11-29 2002-06-11 Marconi Communications, Inc. Cooling and heating system for an equipment enclosure using a vortex tube
US6606867B1 (en) * 2000-11-15 2003-08-19 Carrier Corporation Suction line heat exchanger storage tank for transcritical cycles
EP1347251A3 (de) * 2002-03-20 2004-04-28 Carrier Corporation Verfahren zum Erhöhen der Leistungsfähigkeit einer Dampfverdichtungsanordnung mittels Verdampferheizung
CN110986408A (zh) * 2019-12-13 2020-04-10 中国科学院合肥物质科学研究院 一种集成式氖气制冷机及制冷方法

Citations (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3194026A (en) * 1963-10-24 1965-07-13 Fleur Corp Power-refrigeration system

Patent Citations (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3194026A (en) * 1963-10-24 1965-07-13 Fleur Corp Power-refrigeration system

Cited By (10)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US3494145A (en) * 1968-06-10 1970-02-10 Worthington Corp Integral turbo compressor-expander system for refrigeration
US4106304A (en) * 1976-07-26 1978-08-15 Michael Eskeli Thermodynamic compressor
US4178766A (en) * 1976-07-26 1979-12-18 Michael Eskeli Thermodynamic compressor method
US4444024A (en) * 1981-08-04 1984-04-24 Mcfee Richard Dual open cycle heat pump and engine
US4420941A (en) * 1983-05-10 1983-12-20 Demos Papastavros Cooling system
US4936109A (en) * 1986-10-06 1990-06-26 Columbia Energy Storage, Inc. System and method for reducing gas compressor energy requirements
US6606867B1 (en) * 2000-11-15 2003-08-19 Carrier Corporation Suction line heat exchanger storage tank for transcritical cycles
US6401463B1 (en) 2000-11-29 2002-06-11 Marconi Communications, Inc. Cooling and heating system for an equipment enclosure using a vortex tube
EP1347251A3 (de) * 2002-03-20 2004-04-28 Carrier Corporation Verfahren zum Erhöhen der Leistungsfähigkeit einer Dampfverdichtungsanordnung mittels Verdampferheizung
CN110986408A (zh) * 2019-12-13 2020-04-10 中国科学院合肥物质科学研究院 一种集成式氖气制冷机及制冷方法

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Publication number Publication date
NL6500777A (de) 1966-06-16
FR1457885A (fr) 1966-11-04
CH425848A (de) 1966-12-15
GB1057507A (en) 1967-02-01

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