Fluid Cooler Vs Cooling Tower

Let’s take a look at the similarities and differences between fluid coolers and cooling towers.

What Is A Cooling Tower?

 A device used for taking the heat from a system is called a ‘Cooling Tower’. These devices are used as heat rejecters. They reject the heat by cooling down a stream of water that is channeled from industrial processes and/or channeled from an HVAC system, whereas, the unwanted heat gets taken out of the liquid by way of the cooling tower, using different methods.

There are two types of cooling towers, the dry bulb & the wet bulb. Each of which use a process different than the other for cooling the liquid in the cooling tower down.

Dry Bulb Systems

This type has to rely on a cooling tower that has a closed circuit, operating close to the dry bulbs air temperature. The dry bulb temperature gives a reading that comes from a thermometer which hangs freely in the air, however, it is being shielded to keep from the moisture, and also from the radiation.

Wet Bulb Systems

This type has to rely on the evaporation. The towers function is solely based on the temperature reading of the wet bulb, and it is taking into account the humidity in the air, circling the cooling tower.

What Are Cooling Towers Used For?

Some of the cooling towers are used for the HVAC systems that are used to cool down huge commercial buildings, which also includes cooling down the water used by thermal power stations, chemical plants, oil refineries, and petrochemical plants. There are two different kinds of cooling towers, depending on their location, as well as their applications. The air to be cooled is channeled through in two different ways from the cooling towers, they are the induced draft and the natural draft.

Industrial Purposes

The size of a cooling tower on an industrial site will depend on the amount of heat their processes are producing. In industries that need to have a higher level of heat rejected away from their system will be using cooling towers like the ones used in nuclear power plants. They are monolithic structures standing more than 600 feet in height. However, not all of them are as tall as that, there are many processes requiring a cooling tower that is more than just roof mounted, which is common for the HVAC systems.

The cooling towers of an industry can reject heat at the highest levels. For instance, there is a whole lot of heat produced in power plants that run off of burning coal, and this requires a whole lot of water to keep the plant cooled down. That is the reason that it is piping around 315,000 gallons of water every hour through its system. Theoretically speaking, a cooling tower could be cooled down using water that comes straight from a pipe or another water source near the plant. Although, the system would need more than 2 million gallons of water every hour to stay cooled down. The same amount of water would need to go back to the source it came from, which means taking it from the plant again.

It is very clear that that kind of exchange in heated water, the water in the ponds, rivers, and lakes, will certainly change. A significant change in the waters temperature combine with the delicate ecosystem could kill all the plant and animal life. Now that the astronomical heat levels being created during the industrial processes is clear that it is rejecting the heat back into the cooling towers, and instead is destroying our eco system.

HVAC

Trying to cool down huge commercial building with the same type of air-conditioning as we use for residential applications would not only be costly, but impractical as well. The cooling towers used for huge commercial buildings can generally be found on their roof tops.

However, you will find that these cooling towers are much smaller than the ones used for industrial plants. Cooling towers that are used by HVAC applications is meant to reject heat that is being produced from the chiller. The cooling tower and the water cooled chiller work together.

What Is A Fluid Cooler?

Fluid cooler systems are generally used in applications featuring warmer temperatures. These systems come with copper tubes that feature aluminum fins and fans. The coolest practical leaving fluid temperature is around 10 degrees warmer than the air that enters the application from the outside.

These coolers are not as efficient as cooling towers, though. They will also come with a larger price tag and a larger footprint. Once installed, fluid coolers will come with less maintenance needs than the average cooling tower. The average operating costs of a fluid cooler will fall between that of a chiller and cooling tower.

Cooling Tower Maintenance & Repair

If you own or manage a property that uses cooling towers for HVAC or industrial cooling they need to be maintained and repaired when necessary.  All Kote Lining, Inc. offers cooling tower maintenance & repair as well as refurbishment