Mathematical modeling of humidification process by means of hollow fiber membrane contactor

Modeling and simulation of air humidification by hollow fiber membrane contactors are investigated in the current study. A computational fluid dynamic model was developed by solving the k-epsilon turbulence 2D Navier-Stokes equations as well as mass conservation equations for steady-state conditions in membrane contactors. Finite element method is used for the study of the air humidification under different operating conditions, with a focus on the humidity density, total mass transfer flux and velocity field. There has been good agreement between simulation results and experimental data obtained from literature. It is found that the enhancement of air stream decreases the outlet humidity from 0.392 to 0.340 (module 1) and from 0.467 to 0.337 (module 2). The results also indicated that there has been an increase in air velocity in the narrow space of shell side compared with air velocity wide space of shell side. Also, irregular arrangement has lower dead zones than regular arrangement which leads to higher water flux.