Temperature field and stress field analysis of molten salt U-tube heat exchanger based on fluid-thermal-solid coupling method

BackgroundWith advantages of low system pressure, stable operation and good economic performance, molten salt heat exchanger has recently been widely applied to the field of energy as concentrating solar power, nuclear power engineering, high temperature hydrogen production, and so on.PurposeThis study aims to analyze the thermal stress generated in the main components of the U-tube heat exchanger due to the high operating temperature of the molten salt and the large temperature difference between the hot and cold fluids.MethodsFluid-thermal-solid coupling method was adopted in this study. First of all, the main thermal performance parameters of the heat exchanger were obtained by using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) computation, and compared with experimental results to verify the accuracy of the CFD fluid simulation results. On this basis, the heat transfer process was analyzed in details for the molten salt tube-shell heat exchange under the operating condition, and the flow field and temperature field