Experimental Convection Heat Transfer Analysis of a Nano-Enhanced Industrial Coolant

Convection heat transfer coefficients and pressure drops of four functionalized graphene nanoplatelet nanofluids based on the commercial coolant Havoline(®) XLC Pre-mixed 50/50 were experimentally determined to assess its thermal performance. The potential heat transfer enhancement produced by nanofluids could play an important role in increasing the efficiency of cooling systems. Particularly in wind power, the increasing size of the wind turbines, up to 10 MW nowadays, requires sophisticated liquid cooling systems to keep the nominal temperature conditions and protect the components from temperature degradation and hazardous environment in off-shore wind parks. The effect of nanoadditive loading, temperature and Reynolds number in convection heat transfer coefficients and pressure drops is discussed. A dimensionless analysis of the results is carried out and empirical correlations for the Nusselt number and Darcy friction factor are proposed. A maximum enhancement in the convection heat transfer coefficient of 7% was found for the nanofluid with nanoadditive loading of 0.25 wt %. Contrarily, no enhancement was found for the nanofluids of higher functionalized graphene nanoplatelet mass fraction.