Carbon dioxide heat transfer coefficients and pressure drops during flow boiling: assessment of predictive methods

Among the alternatives to the HCFCs and HFCs, carbon dioxide emerged as one of the most promising environmentally friendly refrigerants. In past years many works were carried out about CO2 flow boiling and very different two-phase flow characteristics from conventional fluids were found. In order to assess the best predictive methods for the evaluation of CO2 heat transfer coefficients and pressure gradients in macro-channels, in the current article a literature survey of works and a collection of the results of statistical comparisons available in literature are furnished. In addition the experimental data from University of Naples are used to run a deeper analysis. Both a statistical and a direct comparison against some of the most quoted predictive methods are carried out. Methods implemented both for low–medium pressure refrigerants and specifically developed for R744 are used in the comparison. Some general indications about the choice of the predictive methods dependently on the operating conditions are given.