The use of a mass cooler makes it possible to “cap” short-term temperature spikes in exhaust gases, which permits amongst other things the use of less expensive filter media.
Temperature spikes occur during the extraction of metallurgical processes such as charging and tapping processes or through the addition of exothermic substances to melts. It is particularly necessary to avoid temperature spikes during the ejection of coke from coke batteries; in this situation, the mass cooler also functions as a mass storage device – the heat energy stored when the temperature spike occurs is subsequently returned to the exhaust gas, which protects downstream plant components from corrosion caused by undershooting of the dew point.
Depending on the required cooling effect, the design focuses either on standalone coolers or on individual mass cooler packets that are inserted in extraction lines. The mass coolers can also be used as spark arresters.
Because of the complicated transient heat transfer and thermal conductivity processes, these systems are dimensioned with the assistance of computers.
