CBE 3322: Heat Transfer Operations

Section 1 - Introduction

Dominic Pjontek, Ph.D., P.Eng.

University of Western Ontario
Fundamentals of heat transfer

◼ How can we define heat transfer…?

❑ Thermal energy in transit due to a temperature difference

◼ Heating or cooling of materials/streams is an indispensable part of

processing, production, or fabrication jobs in engineering practice.

◼ Anytime a temperature difference is present in a medium or

between media, heat transfer will occur.

◼ Our main objective is to find the most economic method to heat

or cool a stream, thus minimizing the respective heat loss or gain.

Introduction 2
Modes of heat transfer
Conduction Convection Radiation

◼ Conduction: heat transfer across a medium

◼ Convection: heat transfer between a solid surface and a moving fluid

◼ Radiation: heat transfer between two surfaces at different

temperatures

Introduction 3
Examples of heat transfer applications
space shuttle thermal tiles

home insulation

car radiator

Introduction 4
Applications in Chemical Engineering

◼ One of the most widely used heat exchangers in chemical processes:

❑ Shell and tube heat exchanger
◼ Can you identify the various modes of heat transfer within the unit?

Introduction 5
Heat transfer definition

◼ It is important to distinguish thermodynamics and heat transfer.

❑ Thermodynamics is concerned with equilibrium states of
matter. Hence, it can determine the amount of energy required
to pass from one equilibrium state to another.
❑ Heat transfer requires a temperature gradient, which
represents thermodynamic non-equilibrium.

◼ For example:
❑ If we cool a 1 kg bar of iron from 1000°C to 100°C in an oil
bath, what is the loss of internal energy (Q) for the iron bar?
❑ Assume CP = 450 J/kg·K

Introduction 6
Heat transfer definition

◼ However, thermodynamics cannot tell us how long we have to wait

for the temperature to reach 100°C in the previous example.
❑ This depends on the physical properties of the oil and the fluid
dynamics (i.e., mixing) in the bath.

◼ Heat transfer thus studies what thermodynamics is inherently

unable to do:
❑ Quantify the rate (q) at which heat transfer occurs in terms of
the degree of thermal non-equilibrium.

◼ How are the first and second law of thermodynamics applied to heat
transfer?

Introduction 7
Conservation of energy

◼ Since we are trying to study the rate at which heat is transferred

(q), this can be considered an extension of thermodynamics.

◼ The first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy) is

thus valid and quite useful to solve heat transfer problems.

◼ Conservation of energy can be applied for a specific time basis,

leading to two cases for our application:
1. At a given instant (t)
2. Over a specified time interval (Δt)

Introduction 8
Conservation of energy

◼ A general form of the conservation of energy can be expressed as:

dE
Ein − Eout + Egenerated =
dt
Control Volume

Ein dE Eout
Egenerated
dt

Introduction 9
Surface energy balance

◼ One special case for energy conservation is when it is applied to the

surface of a medium. This removes the generation and
accumulation terms from the balance, resulting in the following:

E in = E out

q"rad For the simplified example on

the left, we know based on the
q"cond conservation of energy that:

q"conv q"cond = q"rad + q"conv

Introduction 10
Conduction

◼ Thermal conduction is the transfer of internal energy by

microscopic diffusion and collisions of molecules/particles within a
body. It occurs in the presence of a temperature difference and is
not accompanied by any macroscopic or bulk motion in the medium.

◼ The rate equation for conduction is known as Fourier’s Law:

" dT
q = −k
x
dx
temperature gradient [K/m]
heat flux [W/m2]

thermal conductivity [W/m·K]

Introduction 11
Conduction (Example 1)

◼ The heat flux through a wood slab 50 mm thick, whose inner and
outer surface temperatures are 40 and 20°C, respectively, has been
determined to be 40 W/m2. What is the thermal conductivity of the
wood?

Introduction 12
Conduction (Example 2)

◼ A square silicon chip (k = 150 W/m·K) with a width of 5 mm and a

thickness of 1 mm is mounted such that its side and bottom
surfaces are insulated, while the top is exposed to a coolant.
◼ If 4 W of heat are being dissipated in the circuits mounted to the
bottom surface of the chip, what is the steady-state temperature
difference between the bottom and top surfaces?

Introduction 13
Convection

◼ Convection refers to heat transfer that occurs between a surface

and a moving fluid at different temperatures. More specifically,
convection consists of two mechanisms:
❑ random molecular motion (diffusion)
❑ bulk or macroscopic motion of a fluid (advection)

◼ The rate equation for convection is Newton’s law of cooling:

heat flux [W/m2]

q" = h (TS − T ) fluid temperature [K]

surface temperature [K]

convective heat transfer coefficient [W/m2·K]

Introduction 14
Convection

◼ Different forms of convection can be classified based on the nature

of the flow:
Natural
Forced

Sensible heat

Latent heat

Boiling Condensation

Introduction 15
Convection (Example)

◼ Let’s compare the heat loss experienced when placing your hand
out of the window of a moving car to one place into flowing water.
Assume the surface of your hand is at 30°C.
❑ The car is moving at 35 km/h in air at -5°C with a convection
coefficient of 40 W/m2·K.

❑ Flowing water with a velocity of 0.2 m/s and a temperature of

10°C, where the convection coefficient is 900 W/m2·K.

❑ Compare this with a heat loss of approximately 30 W/m2 under

ambient room conditions.

Introduction 16
Radiation

◼ Thermal radiation is energy continuously emitted by matter which is

at a finite temperature.
❑ Radiation energy is transmitted by electromagnetic waves
❑ Energy transferred by radiation does not require a material
medium, in fact, it is most efficient in a vacuum.

◼ The upper limit for energy emitted by a surface (referred as an ideal

radiator or blackbody) is described by the Stefan-Boltzmann law:

E =  TS4
emissive power [W/m2] surface temperature [K]

Stefan-Boltzmann constant [σ = 5.67 x 10-8 W/m2·K4]

Introduction 17
Radiation

◼ In reality, the efficiency of a surface’s energy emission is quantified

by its emissivity (0 ≤ ε ≤ 1): E out =   TS4

◼ We have only considered energy emitted. We must also account for

the irradiation of a surface from its surrounding (G). Similar to the
emissivity, a surface’s ability to absorb is quantified by its
absorptivity (0 ≤ α ≤ 1): Ein =  G
❑ If α < 1, the irradiation is either reflected or transmitted

Introduction 18
Radiation

◼ A special case often occurs for engineering purposes:

❑ small surface at Ts that is surrounded by much larger
isothermal surface at Tsurr
❑ the irradiation can be approximated as the emission from a
blackbody at Tsurr: Ein =  G =   Tsurr
4

❑ if we assume that α ≈ ε for the surface (gray surface)

◼ The net rate of radiation heat transfer from the surface is then:

q" = E out − Ein = Ts4 − Tsurr

4

(
q" =   Ts4 − Tsurr
4
)

Introduction 19
Radiation (Example 1)

◼ Why does it “feel” colder in your house during the winter even if the
room temperature is the same as during the summer?

❑ Let’s assume the air temperature is maintained at 20°C

throughout the year.

❑ The wall temperature during the summer may be estimated at

27°C during the summer and 14°C during the winter.

❑ We will assume the average temperature of the exposed

surface of a person to be 32°C and that they have an
emissivity of 0.90.

❑ The natural convective heat transfer coefficient for a person

and ambient air is approximately 2 W/m2·K.

Introduction 20
Energy balance (Online Example)

◼ Hot combustion gases in a furnace are separated from the ambient

air and its surroundings, which are at 25°C, by a brick wall 0.15 m
thick. The brick has a thermal conductivity of 1.2 W/m·K and a
surface emissivity of 0.8. Under steady-state conditions, and outer
surface temperature of 100°C is measured. Free convection heat
transfer to the air adjoining the surface is characterized by a
convection coefficient of h = 20 W/m2·K.

◼ What is the brick inner surface temperature?

Introduction 21