investigation of gas turbine intake air cooling via evaporative media and its effects on cartridge filters pressures drop

the aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of evaporative media as gas turbine intake air cooling method on pressure drop of cartridge air filters. this study performed under the laboratory condition, using stainless steel test rig with specified dimensions to investigate the role of evaporative media in air cooling as well as its effects on new and used cartridge filters (as representative of clean and loaded filters). tests were carried out at three five hours consecutive stages including, warm -dry stage (ta=35-40°c) and relative humidity ([rh] =10-15%), cold - humid stage (ta=22-27°c and rh=80 to 85%), and, warm-dry stage (ta=35-40 °c and rh=10-15%) for 3 consecutive days. findings showed that using evaporative media caused air intake temperature reduction was equal to 12.5 °c. total pressure drop of cartridge filters was 5.13±0.84 and 3.86±0.14 mbar for used and new filters, respectively. results of repeated measure test showed that the differences between new and used filters pressure drop was significant (p=0.001). combined effects of humidity and dust loading on filters pressure drop demonstrated that cartridge filters were not affected by humidity (p=0.75) and the main reason of pressure drop was due to collected dust on filters. it is concluded that using evaporative media systems is suitable method for cooling gas turbine intake and increase turbine efficiency without any significant increase of filter pressure drop in hot-dry climate.