How Efficient Is a Heat Exchanger?

Heat exchangers transfer heat between liquids and gases and are used in everything from laptops to cars to power plants. In Alaska, heat exchangers can play an important role in using waste heat from a utility’s diesel engines to create ice for seafood processing. 

David Denkenberger of ACEP and Josiah Alverts, a newly graduated UAF mechanical engineering student, recently published a research paper on Denkenberger’s patented heat exchanger in the peer-reviewed journal Designs. The article explains how the MATLAB program is used to analyze the efficiency of the heat exchanger, taking into account that not all channels get the same amount of flow. 

This project is supported by the Office of Naval Research, through the Alaska Regional Collaboration for Technology Innovation and Commercialization, and the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust.

For more information, please contact David Denkenberger at ddenkenberger@alaska.edu.

 

Heat exchanger graphic by Josiah Alverts.