Available online at www.sciencedirect.

com

Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715

2013 International Symposium on Environmental Science and Technology (2013 ISEST)

Theoretical calculation of heat transfer coefficient when

sludge drying in a nara-type paddle dryer using different heat
carriers
Wenyi Deng*, Yaxin Su, Weichao Yu
College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Donghua University, Shanghai 201620, China

Abstract

Heat transfer characteristics of three typical heat carriers, i.e. saturated steam, thermal oil and flue gas, for indirect
paddle dryer were studied. The convective heat transfer coefficient (HTC) of the three heat carriers were theoretically
calculated. The contact resistance and penetration resistance were also determined by the penetration model. In the
examined range, the significance of different heat resistances were investigated. The convective resistance was
dominant in the flue gas based drying systems, while the penetration resistance was dominant in the saturated steam
based drying system. In the thermal oil based drying system, both the convective resistance and the penetration
resistance were significant. The drying rate of sewage sludge in the different heat carrier based drying systems was
simulated by the penetration model. The effect of heat transfer resistances on the drying kinetics of sewage sludge
was investigated.

©
© 2013 The Authors.
2013 The Authors. Published
Publishedby
byElsevier
ElsevierB.V.
B.V.
Selection and/or
Selection and peer-review
peer-review under
under responsibility
responsibility of Beijing
of Beijing Institute
Institute of Technology.
of Technology.

Keywords: Sludge; Drying; Paddle dryer; Heat carrier

1. Introduction

Industrial and domestic wastewater produce large quantities of residual sludge. Nowadays, a wide
reduction of sludge volumes is necessary. Sludge drying is a very effective volume reduction method, and
also an important intermediate treatment process as compared with other sludge building materials, etc.
Thermal drying of sewage sludge is widely recognized as an efficient means to transform wet sludge into
a solid form that allows easy handling, storage, and recycling [1, 2]. There are three categories of dryers
for thermal drying of sludge, i.e. indirect dryers [3], direct dryers, and combined dryers [4, 5]. The

* Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 021-67792555; fax: +86 021-67792522.

E-mail address: dengwy@dhu.edu.cn.

1878-0296 © 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Selection and peer-review under responsibility of Beijing Institute of Technology.
doi:10.1016/j.proenv.2013.04.096
710 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715

indirect dryers have the advantages of producing minimal amounts of vapors, no pollution of heat carrier
and lower energy consumption than direct ones. Reports on drying kinetics of sludge in indirect dryers
can be found abundantly [6-11]. Saturated steam and thermal oil are typical heat carriers for indirect
dryers. Flue gas is only occasionally used in indirect dryers [8]. Saturated steam, thermal oil and flue gas
are markedly different in physical properties and heat transfer (HT) characteristics.
In this study, the HT characteristics of saturated steam, thermal oil and flue gas in a Nara-type paddle
dryer were investigated based on theoretical simulation. Drying kinetics of a municipal sewage sludge in
the paddle dryer with different heat carriers were also presented.

2. Heat transfer in Nara-type dryer

Fig. 1 shows the 3D structure and sectional view of the Nara-type paddle dryer. The paddle dryer is
constructed by wedge-shaped paddles, two hollow shafts, and a jacket. Heat carrier can pass through the
paddles, the shaft and the jacket. During sludge drying, sludge is supplied to one end of the dryer and is
continuously transferred to the other end. Sludge in the paddle dryer is continuously agitated by the
rotating paddles, and is thermally dried by the heat from the heat carrier.

Fig. 1. Nara-type paddle dryer.

In the indirect dryers, the overall heat transfer resistances are composed of the contact resistance
between material and hot wall, the conductive resistance of the hot wall, and the convective resistance
between hot wall and heat carrier. It is reasonable to infer that the significance of the three resistances are
markedly different for different heat-carriers-based indirect dryers. Fig. 2 shows the HT resistances in the
paddle dryer, including the convective resistance between heat carrier and dryer wall, the conductive
resistance of dryer wall, and the contact resistance between the hot surface of the dryer and sludge bulk.
Different heat carriers are mainly characterized by their different convective resistances, whose effect on
sludge drying kinetics will be discussed subsequently based on the contact drying model (penetration
model). The penetration resistance is the heat transfer resistance in sludge bulk.

Fig. 2. HT resistances in paddle dryer.

In this study, three kinds of heat carriers were studied, i.e. saturated steam, thermal oil and flue gas.
Since these three heat carriers are much different in physical properties, the inner structure of the dryer
 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715 711

paddles were differently constructed for different heat carriers. Fig. 3 shows the inner structure of paddles
for saturated steam, thermal oil and flue gas, respectively. Detailed description of the inner structure of
paddles can be found elsewhere [3, 12].

(a) Paddle for saturated steam (b) Paddle for thermal oil (c) Paddle for flue gas

Fig. 3. Inner structure of paddles for different heat carriers.

It should be noted that the outline dimensions of the paddle dryer, for different heat-carrier-based
drying study, are identical. A typical municipal sewage sludge from China was adopted for theoretical
study. The detailed description of the sewage sludge can be found in our previous study [11].

3. Determination of heat transfer coefficient (HTC)

3.1. Determination of convective resistance of heat carrier

When saturated steam was used as heat carrier, as shown in Fig. 3(a), the saturated steam flowing in
the hollow shafts can be considered as a pipe flow. Therefore, the condensation-HTC of saturated steam
was calculated based on the following equation [13, 14]:

ª gU w U w  U v O3w >r  0.68cp,w Ts  Tw @º

14

hSS
0.555« (1)
»
¬ P w d T s  Tw  ¼
When thermal oil was used as heat carrier, as shown in Fig. 3(b), the heat transfer coefficient of
thermal oil forced flowing in pipe can be calculated by Dittus-Boelter correlation [15]:

Nuoil 0.8
0.023Reoil 0.3
Proil (2)

O0.7
oil
0.8
woil cp U 0.3
oil (3)
hW O 0.023
d 0.2 Q oil
0.5

It should be noted that eqn.(2) is only valid when Re is in the range of 104–1.2×105, and Pr in the range of
0.7–120. Therefore, the velocity of thermal oil was chosen in the range of 0.2–1.8 m/s for calculation.
When flue gas was used as heat carrier, as shown in Fig. 3(b), The convective HTC of flue gas hWG
can also be simulated by Dittus-Boelter correlation [15]. The HTC hWG of flue gas forced flowing in pipe
was determined by the equation:
Og § w · 0.8 0.3
hWG 0.023 0.2 ¨ ¸ Prg (4)
d © Q ¹g
Since eqn.(4) is only valid when Re is in the range of 104–1.2×105, the velocity of flue gas was chosen in
the range of 6.0–16.0 m/s for calculation.
712 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715

3.2. Determination of conductive resistance of dryer-wall

The stainless steel of 304# (0Cr18Ni9Ti) is commonly used as dryer material. It is supposed that the
thickness of dryer wall was δ = 5 mm. Therefore, the HTC of the dryer wall can be determined by
equation:
hcond =λS/δ (5)

3.3. Determination of contact resistance between sludge and wall

The contact resistance hcont is given by the following equation [16]:

ª 2OV d º (6)
hcont «M AD wp  1  M A   4C12Tm3 »
¬ 2  2l  2Z  d ¼
where αwp is the heat transfer coefficient for a single particle and is calculated by:
4OV ª§ 2l  2G · § d · º (7)
D wp ¨1  ¸ ln ¨1  ¸  1»
d «¬© d ¹ © 2l  2G ¹ ¼
Detailed description of contact resistance determination method can be found in our previous study[11].

3.4. Heat penetration coefficient (HPC) in sludge bulk

The HPC in sludge bulk is given by [17]:

2 OUC 
p bed (8)
hpenetration
erf ]  St r
Detailed description of contact resistance determination method can also be found in our previous
study [11]. Fig. 4 shows the HPC of a sewage sludge bulk at different moisture content. The physical
properties of the sludge were shown inTable 1 [11].

Table 1. Thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity, packing density and specific heat capacity of dried sewage sludge bed at 25°C.

Thermal conductivity Thermal diffusivity Packing density Specific heat capacity

(W/m °C) (10-7 m2/s) (kg/m3) (J/kg °C)

0.134 1.60 758.20 1040+2.72T(°C)

h penetration, HTC in sludge bulk (W/m -ºC)


2












   
X , Moisture content (kg moisture/kg dry solid)

Fig. 4. HPC in sludge bulk .

 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715 713

4. Results and discussion

Fig. 5 shows the percentage of different thermal resistances at different heat carrier based drying
systems. In the saturated steam based drying system, the penetration resistance is the main thermal
resistance which accounted for 66.1% of the total thermal resistance, while the convective resistance only
accounted for 7.8% due to the high HTC of saturated steam. In the thermal oil based drying system, the
convective resistance and the penetration resistance are the main thermal resistances. The velocity of
thermal oil had an obvious effect on distribution of thermal resistances. In the flue gas based drying
system, the convective resistance accounted for more than 90% of the total thermal resistance when the
current velocity of the flue gas was lower than 12 m/s. Fig. 6 shows the overall HTC of the drying system,
htotal. In the examined range, saturated steam was the most efficient heat carrier for indirect drying system.
The overall HTC Flue gas was so much lower than saturated steam and thermal oil that it was not an
appropriate heat carrier for indirect drying. Although the low convective HTC of flue gas can partly be
overcame by enhancing gas temperature, this was strictly limited by the dryer material.

Convective resistance Conductive resistance

Contact resistance Penetration resistance
100%
Percentage of different thermal resistance

80%

60%

40%

20%

0%
Steam Oil1 Oil2 Gas1 Gas2

Fig. 5. Percentage of different thermal resistances (Steam: 200 °C; Oil1: 200 °C, 1.5 m/s; Oil2: 200 °C, 0.6 m/s; Gas1: 200 °C, 6
m/s; Gas1: 200 °C, 12 m/s; Average particle diameter: d = 1.0×10-4 m).
Overall heat transfer coefficient W/(m2 °C)

1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0
Steam Oil1 Oil2 Gas1 Gas2

Fig. 6. Overall HTCs based on different heat carriers (Steam: 200 °C; Oil1: 200 °C, 1.5 m/s; Oil2: 200 °C, 0.6 m/s; Gas1: 200 °C, 6
m/s; Gas1: 200 °C, 12 m/s).
714 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715

The drying rate of the above referred sewage sludge in the different heat carrier based drying systems
can be simulated by the penetration model [16]:

m
't exp  9 2  
(9)
1 htotal  1 hpenetration 'H total
Fig. 7 shows the simulated drying rates of the sewage sludge in the different heat carrier based drying
system. It can be found that, under the same heat carrier temperature, the higher overall HTC led to the
higher sludge drying rate. The drying rate of saturated steam or thermal oil based drying system was
much higher than that of flue gas based drying system.
During calculation, it was supposed that the temperature of heat carrier was a constant. However, since
thermal oil and flue gas were sensible heat flow, their temperature will decrease continuously during
drying. This will make the actual drying rate curve more steeper. As discussed above, the contact
resistance hcont was strongly depended on particle diameter. The particle diameter of 1.0×10-4 m was used
for hcont calculation in this study. In fact, the particle diameter of sludge was not a constant during drying
process, since sludge drying is accompanied by phase changing (i.e., pasty, lumpy and granular phases
with decrease of moisture content) and granule formation. The particle diameters in the pasty, lumpy and
granular phases should be distinctively considered for theoretical calculation.

0.02
0.018
0.016
Drying rate, kg moisture/m 2-s

0.014
0.012
0.01
0.008
0.006
0.004
0.002
0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
Moisture content, kg moisture/kg dry solid

Fig. 7. Sludge drying rate in different heat carrier based drying system (◊: Saturated steam at 200 °C; □: Thermal oil at 200 °C, 1.5
m/s; ●: Thermal oil at 200 °C, 0.6 m/s; ∆: Flue gas at 200 °C, 6 m/s; ○: Flue gas at 200 °C, 12 m/s; *: Flue gas at 400 °C, 12
m/s ).

5. Conclusions

Based on the above discussion on indirect paddle type dryer, it can be concluded that saturated steam
is a much more ideal heat carrier than thermal oil and flue gas, due to its high thermal capacity and high
HTC. Under the same evaporation load, the saturated steam based drying system can be operated under
lower drying temperature than thermal oil or flue gas based drying system. Nonetheless, it should be
noted that saturated steam has a higher demand for metal material of paddle dryer due to its higher
operating pressure.
 Wenyi Deng et al. / Procedia Environmental Sciences 18 (2013) 709 – 715 715

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Shanghai Natural Science Foundation (No. 11ZR1400700)

References

[1] Grüter H, Matter M, Oehlmann KH, et al. Drying of Sewage Sludge -an Important Step in Waste Disposal. Water Science and
Technology, 1990, 22(12): 57-63.
[2] Arlabosse P, Chavez S, Prevot C. Drying of Municipal Sewage Sludge: from a Laboratory Scale Batch Indirect Dryer to the
Paddle Dryer. Brazilian Journal of Chemical Engineering, 2005, 22(2): 227-232.
[3] Devahastin S, Mujumdar AS. Indirect Dryers, CRC Press, Boca Raton, 2007.
[4] Lowe P. Development in the Thermal Drying of Sewage Sludge. Water and Environmental Journal, 1995, 9(3): 306-316.
[5] Hudson JA, Lowe P. Current Technologies for Sludge Treatment and Disposal. Water and Environmental Journal, 1996, 10(6):
436-441.
[6] Dittler A, Bamberger T, Gehrmann D, et al. Measurement and Simulation of The Vacuum Contact Drying of Pastes in a LIST-
Type Kneader Drier. Chemical Engineering and Processing, 1997, 36(4): 301-308.
[7] Oakley D. Contact Dryers. London, Blackie Academic & Professional, 1997.
[8] Chun WP, Lee KW. Sludge Drying Characteristics on Combined System of Contact Dryer and Fluidized Bed Dryer. Drying
2004 - Proceeding of the 14th International Drying Symposium (IDS 2004), Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2004.
[9] Arlabosse P, Chitu T. Identification of the Limiting Mechanism in Contact Drying of Agitated Sewage Sludge. Drying
Technology, 2007, 25(4):557-567.
[10] Lecomte D, Fudym O, Carrere-Gee C, et al. Method for the Design of a Contact Dryer-Application to Sludge Treatment in
Thin Film Boiling. Drying Technology, 2004, 22(9): 2151-2172.
[11] Deng WY, Yan JH, Li XD, et al. Measurement and Simulation of the Contact Drying of Sewage Sludge in a Nara-Type Paddle
Dryer. Chemical Engineering Science, 2009, 64(24): 5117-5124.
[12] Pan YK, Wang ZX, Liu XD. Modern Drying Technology. Beijing, Chemical Industry Press, 2007. (in Chinese)
[13] Boyko LD, Kruzhilin GN. Heat Transfer and Hydraulic Resistance During Condensation of Steam in a Horizontal Tube and in
a Bundle of Tubes. International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, 1967, 10(2): 361-373.
[14] Shah MM. A General Correlation for Heat Transfer during Film Condensation Inside Pipes. International Journal of Heat and
Mass Transfer, 1979, 22(3): 547-556.
[15] Guan T, Liu XY, Peng ZG. Calculation for Convective Heat Transfer Coefficient of Organic Heat Transfer Material Forced
Flowing in Tube. Industrial Boiler, 2002, 76(6): 9-11. (in Chinese)
[16] Mollekopf N, Martin H. Zur Theorie des Wärmeübergangs an bewegte Kugelschüttungen bei kurzfristigem Kontakt. VT-
Verfahrenstechnik, 1982, 16: 701-706.
[17] Schlünder EU, Mollekopf N. Vacuum Contact Drying of Free Flowing Mechanically Agitated Particulate Materials. Chemical
Engineering and Processing, 1984, 18 (2), 93-111.