Effects of vapor pressure of desiccant solution on mass transfer performance for a spray-bed absorber

Abstract

The depression in vapor pressure caused by adding desiccant to liquid water can be regarded as the driving force for the dehumidification process. The vapor pressure depends on the temperature and the concentration. Therefore, the purpose in this study is to discuss the mass transfer performance affected by operating variables and to show that the vapor pressure is a key factor affecting the mass transfer performance for absorbing water vapor by triethylene glycol (TEG) solution. The experimental results showed that the mass transfer coefficients were decreased with increases in the temperature and increased with increases in the concentration, respectively, while the mass transfer coefficients were increased with increases in the vapor pressure depression. Although both the average error is within 5% among the mass transfer correlation involving the vapor pressure and that involving the temperature and the concentration in predicting the mass transfer coefficient, there are just two terms, those are vapor pressure and fluid flow rate, associated with operating variables used in the mass transfer correlation. The depression in vapor pressure was not only proved to be the driving force for absorbing water vapor by a desiccant solution, but also a key factor affecting the mass transfer performance.