A Critical Review on Heat Transfer of Supercritical Fluids

Abstract

Supercritical fluids have been widely used in a variety of applications, in which heat transfer under supercritical pressure is of great importance. This paper presents a critical review on supercritical heat transfer, including a summary on the past work focusing on in-tube heat transfer and the pseudo-boiling concept, the understanding of the mechanisms of supercritical heat transfer, and suggestions for future work. For supercritical fluids heated in tubes, the typical characteristics, the effects of various parameters, the buoyancy and flow acceleration effects, and the heat transfer deterioration phenomenon are all discussed, and the heat transfer correlations and numerical methodologies are summarized. For supercritical fluids cooled in tubes, the experimental observations and explanations, the proposed heat transfer correlations, and the numerical results are summarized and discussed. More importantly, this review provides a comprehensive review of the supercritical pseudo-boiling concept, including the experimentally observed pseudo-boiling phenomenon, the theoretical studies for supercritical fluids to reveal their heterogenous two-phase features, and the progress in the application of the pseudo-boiling concept on supercritical heat transfer. Finally, suggestions for future research are provided to further advance the understanding and enable accurate prediction of supercritical heat transfer.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 52106198 and 52130608).

Notes on contributors

Qingyang Wang

Qingyang Wang is an Associate Professor in the School of Energy Power and Mechanical Engineering at North China Electric Power University. He obtained his B.Eng. in energy power system and automation from Tsinghua University in 2015, and Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from University of California San Diego in 2020. His research interests include micro/nanoscale heat transfer, phase change heat transfer and multiphase flow, and supercritical energy transport and conversion.

Jinliang Xu

Jinliang Xu is a Professor at School of Energy Power and Mechanical Engineering, North China Electric Power University. He is currently the Director of Beijing Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow and Heat Transfer for Low Grade Energy Utilization. His research interest includes multiphase flow and heat transfer in micro/nano systems, advanced power generation system, low grade energy and renewable energy utilization. He has published over 200 international journal papers as corresponding author and coauthored two books. He has been the chair or co-chair for multiple international conferences, the editor or associate editor of multiple journals, and the guest editor for the special issue of Applied Thermal Engineering and Energy. He has presented over 40 keynote speeches in international conferences and has been the reviewer for more than 30 journals. He received the Natural Science Award of the Ministry of Education, China (first grade) in 2012. He has been the “973” project chief scientist, Ministry of Science in 2011 and was awarded as “Yangtze River Scholar” Professor by the National Ministry of education, China in 2013.

Chengrui Zhang

Chengrui Zhang is a master student in North China Electric Power University, majoring in power engineering and engineering thermophysics. He received a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Anhui University of Science and Technology. He is currently working in the Beijing Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow and Heat Transfer for Low Grade Energy Utilization. He is devoted to the experimental investigation of supercritical carbon dioxide heat transfer.

Bingtao Hao

Bingtao Hao is a master student in the School of Energy, Power and Mechanical Engineering at North China Electric Power University. He received his bachelor’s degree from Harbin University of Commerce. He is working in the Beijing Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow and Heat Transfer for Low Grade Energy Utilization on flow and heat transfer of supercritical carbon dioxide.

Lixin Cheng

Lixin Cheng has worked at Sheffield Hallam University since 2016. He obtained his Ph.D. in Thermal Energy Engineering at the State Key Laboratory of Multiphase Flow at Xi’an Jiaotong University, China in 1998. He has received several prestigious awards such as Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship in Germany in 2006, an ERCOFTAC Visitor Grant in Switzerland in 2010 and a Distinguished Visiting Professorship of the City of Beijing, China in 2015. His research interests include multiphase flow and heat transfer and thermal energy engineering. He has published more than 100 papers in journals and conferences, 9 book chapters and edited 10 books. He has delivered more than 60 keynote and invited lectures worldwide. He has been the chair of the World Congress on Momentum, Heat and Mass Transfer (MHMT) since 2017. He is one of the founders and co-chair of the International Symposium of Thermal-Fluid Dynamics (ISTFD) series since 2019. He is associate editor of Heat Transfer Engineering and Journal of Fluid Flow, Heat and Mass Transfer, and international advisor of Thermal Power Generation (a Chinese journal).