Prediction of liquid amount in hydrogen liquefaction systems using GM refrigerator

GM냉동기를 이용한 수소액화 시스템의 액화량 예측

Thermodynamic cycle analysis has been performed to maximize the liquid amount for various hydrogen liquefaction systems using GM(Gifford-McMahon) refrigerator. Since the present authors' previous experiments showed that the liquefaction rate was approximately 5.1mg/s in a direct contact with a commercial GM refrigerator, the purpose of this study is to predict how much the liquefaction rate can be increased in different configurations and with improved heat exchanger performance. The optimal operating conditions have been analytically sought with real properties of normal hydrogen for the single-stage GM precooled L-H(Linde-Hampson) system, the two-stage GM direct contact system, the two-stage GM precooled L-H system and the two-stage helium GM-JT (Joule-Thomson) system. The maximum liquefaction rate has been predicted to be only about 7 times greater than the previous experiment, when the two-stage precooling is employed and the effectiveness of heat exchangers approaches to 99.0%. It is concluded that the liquefaction rate is limited mainly by the cooling capacity of the current GM refrigerators and a larger scale of hydrogen liquefaction is possible with a greater capacity of cryocooler at 60-70 K range.