79-12: Evaporative Hat Removal in Wet Cooling Towers

The ratio of evaporative-to-total (sensible plus evap­orative) heat transfer in a wet, crossflow mechanical draft cooling tower was analyzed. The ratio was found to vary from 60% to 90% during typical operating conditions. The evaporative heat removal fraction increased as temper­ature (either wet-bulb or dry-bulb) increased and as relative humidity decreased. Similar results were obtained for a counter-flow, natural draft tower.