Parametric study of plate heat exchanger for eventual use in a solar pasteurization process designed for small milk collection centers in Tunisia

Abstract In this study, we propose to design a solar pasteurization system for small productions collection centers. This system allows minimizing the amount of rejected milk during transport process from the producer to the factory. It consists of solar water collector system, plate hate exchangers (PHE) and an absorption chiller. A numerical study is conducted to evaluate the behavior of the mass and heat transfer through the PHE. An experimental study is performed to determine the plate heat exchanger thermal performances. A comparison between the measured and numerical variation of different fluids temperatures is also conducted. Principal numerical results point out that the turbulence depends on the angle of plate corrugations inclination (β). Experimental results show that for fixed cold fluid flow, the PHE global heat transfer coefficient increases with the hot fluid flow. Its thermal efficiency can reach 80% for a hot water inlet temperature of 80 °C and for a flow rate of 386 l.h−1.