Speaker
Peter Knudsen
(Jefferson Lab)
Description
Most large sub-atmospheric helium refrigeration systems incorporate a heat exchanger at the load, or in the distribution system in some cases, to counter-flow the sub-atmospheric return with the super-critical or liquid supply. A significant process improvement is theoretically obtainable by handling the exergy loss across the Joule-Thompson throttling valve supplying the flow to the load in a simple but different manner. As briefly outline in previous publications, the exergy loss can be minimized by allowing the supply flow pressure to decrease to a sub-atmospheric pressure concurrent with heat exchange with the flow from the load. One practical implementation is to sub-divide the supply flow pressure drop between two heat exchanger sections, incorporating an intermediate pressure drop. Such a test is being performed at Jefferson Lab’s Cryogenic Test Facility (CTF). This paper will briefly discuss the theory, practical implementation and test results and analysis obtained to date.
Primary author
Peter Knudsen
(Jefferson Lab)
Co-author
Dr
Rao GANNI
(JLAB)
