Optimization of airfoil-type PCHE for the recuperator of small scale brayton cycle by cost-based objective function

Supercritical carbon dioxide (SCO2) Brayton cycle gives high efficiency of power cycle with small size. Printed circuit heat exchangers (PCHE) are proper selection for the Brayton cycle because their operability at high temperature and high pressure with small size. Airfoil fin PCHE was suggested by Kim et al. (2008b), it can provide high heat transfer-like zigzag channel PCHE with low pressure drop-like straight channel PCHE. Optimization of the airfoil fin PCHE was not performed like the zigzag channel PCHE. For optimization of the airfoil fin PCHE, the operating condition of the recuperator of SCO2 Integral Experiment Loop (SCIEL) Brayton cycle test loop at Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI) was used. We performed CFD analysis for various airfoil fin configurations using ANSYS CFX 15.0, and made correlations for predicting the Nusselt number and the Fanning friction factor. The recuperator was designed by the simple energy balance code with our correlations. Using the cost-based objective function with production cost and operation cost from size and pressure drop of the recuperator, we evaluated airfoil fin configuration by using total cost and suggested the optimization configuration of the airfoil fin PCHE.