![](/ii/tfec2021.jpg)
ISSN Online: 2379-1748
ISBN Flash Drive: 978-1-56700-517-2
5-6th Thermal and Fluids Engineering Conference (TFEC)
MODELING OF ENHANCED AIR DEHUMIDIFICATION THROUGH ELECTRICALLY CHARGED VAPOR CAPTURING ELECTROSTATIC DROPLETS
要約
This paper investigated the potential of a new electrostatic-based water vapor separation system for humidity control in buildings. The Electrospray Vortical Flow eXchanger (EVFX) consists of small electrically charged water droplets released inside air vortexes to attract water vapor molecules, effectively wiping out the humidity from the air. Larger droplets are then removed at the outer wall of the vortex. If a water molecule is placed in a gradient electric field, such a polar molecule experiences a dielectrophoresis force, which moves the molecules and produces a vapor concentration gradient. When the vapor density exceeds the saturation level,
nucleation occurs. A thermodynamic model that captures this phenomenon was described in this paper. Electrosprayed droplets were initially charged close to their maximum electrical charge dictated by the Rayleigh limit; these droplets were used as nucleation centers. The high electric charge decreased the pressure of the vapor, which was in equilibrium with the droplets. This enhanced the charged droplets' nucleation and
growth that depleted the vapor phase near the droplets, which was compensated for by the dielectrophoresis flow and diffusion. Significant water vapor condensation was predicted for small droplets at a high electrical charge. Beyond a specific droplet size, while the condensation of water vapor was still theoretically possible, it was somewhat limited because the further growth of the large charged droplets was inhibited due to their high inherent water vapor pressure near the surface. A case study illustrated the potentials and limitation of the EVFX for droplets charged to the Rayleigh limit, for which the effective range of diameters resulted
between 10 nm up to few µm.