In traditional chemical cooling systems, water has been widely used as an ideal cooling medium for a long time. However, with the scarcity of water resources and the strengthening of environmental protection awareness, energy-saving, water-saving, and pollution-free air cooled heat exchanger have been more widely used. At present, the most commonly used air cooled heat exchangers (air cooler) in the world are mainly forced draft air cooled heat exchanger, induced draft air cooled heat exchanger and slop- top air cooled heat exchanger.

Compared with the traditional cooling system that uses water as the cooling medium, the air cooler has its advantages and disadvantages. The advantages and disadvantages of these two cooling methods are compared below.

Advantages of air cooling:

1. Air can be obtained for free, and no auxiliary costs are required.
2. If the air cooling is used, the choice of plant site is not restricted.
3. The pressure drop on the air side of the air cooler is only about 100~200Pa, so the operating cost is low.
4. The maintenance cost of the air cooling system is generally only 20% to 30% of the water cooling system.
5. Once the fan power is cut off, the air cooling system still has 30%-40% natural cooling capacity.

Disadvantages of water cooling:

1. Cooling water is often limited by water sources, and auxiliary facilities such as pipelines and pumping stations are required.
2. Sufficient water sources must be considered when selecting the plant site.
3. The water is corrosive and scale. It needs to be treated regularly to prevent fouling and siltation of stolen goods.
4. The circulating water pump has high pressure head and high operating cost.
5. There are many water-cooled equipment, which are easy to scale and often need to be shut down for cleaning.
6. Once the poweris cut off, all production will be stopped.

Disadvantages of air cooling:

1. Since the specific heat of air is small and the cooling effect depends on the dry bulb temperature of air cooling, it is usually impossible to cool the process fluid to ambient temperature.
2. The air cooler is easily affected by ambient temperature, rain, snow, and strong wind.
3. Due to the low heat transfer coefficient and small specific heat on the air side, the air cooler needs a larger area.
4. The air cooler cannot be close to large obstacles, such as buildings and trees, otherwise it will cause hot air circulation.
5. The air cooler needs to use specially finned tubes.
6. There is a certain amount of noise during the operation of the air cooler.

Advantages of water cooling:

1. Water cooling can usually cool the process fluid to 2~3℃ lower than the air temperature, and the circulating water can be cooled to close to the ambient wet bulb temperature in the water tower.
2. Water cooling is not sensitive to changes in ambient temperature.
3. The water cooler has a compact structure, and its cooling area is much smaller than that of the air cooler.
4. The water cooler can be installed between other equipment, such as under the pipeline.
5. General heat exchangers can meet the requirements.
6. No noise.

Through the above analysis, air-cooling and water-cooling systems have their own advantages and disadvantages. We need to make a comprehensive evaluation of air-coolers and water-coolers in the design, and choose air-coolers or water-coolers reasonably according to the specific conditions to achieve economical and energy-saving purpose.

If you have any questions about air cooling system and water cooling system, please contact sales@ghcooling.com, we are glad to provide assistance to you.