Experimental evaluation of the performances of cellulosic pads made out of Kraft and NSSC corrugated papers as evaporative media

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the performances of cellulosic pads made out of Kraft and NSSC corrugated papers in three flute sizes, experimentally. A number of experiments have been done in a wind tunnel in order to evaluate the cooling efficiency and water consumption as a function of air velocity. The tests were carried out at three levels of air velocity (1.8, 2.25, and 2.67 ms(-1)) for three flute sizes of Kraft and NSSC corrugated papers (2.5, 3.5, and 4.5 mm). Analysis of the results indicated that cooling efficiency improves with decrease of air velocity and flute size of corrugated papers; however, water consumption increases with the increase of air velocity. The results were compared with each other and it was shown that the cellulosic pad made out of Kraft paper with 2.5 mm flute size has the highest performance (92%) at 1.8 ms(-1) air velocity in comparison with the other cellulosic pads. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.