Heat Transfer & Hydraulic Resistance at Supercritical Pressures in Power Engineering Applications

By Igor Pioro and Romney Duffey


"Dr. Pioro['s] reputation is excellent. Dr. Duffey has been a leader in the nuclear industry for about three decades..." --Jacopo Buongiorno, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

"The book would be useful to engineers and scientists working with supercritical fluid flow...there is no comparable text on the market." --Vijay Chatoorgoon, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Manitoba.

"I was impressed with the wealth of data and references cited by the authors." --Maan H. Jawad, President, Global Engineering & Technology.


Mechanical and Nuclear Engineerings are currently working on advanced power plants intended for implementation within the next decade. One such Generation IV concept is a supercritical, water-cooled nuclear reactor. In addition, there are already hundreds of supercritical steam generators operating worldwide in the thermal power industry.

These system designs reduce emissions and lower cost by attaining high thermodynamic cycle and economic efficiency, utilizing both natural and forced circulation flows and optimizing heat exchanger and turbine layout and performance. Development, design, and successful operation of these power-generating units require knowledge of heat transfer, pressure drop, and thermal hydraulics at supercritical pressures. Demand for reliable information is high, and until now, no single book related to this topic has been published.

This book brings together and integrates the results from over 500 of the latest sources from the global publications devoted to heat transfer and hydraulic resistance of fluids flowing inside channels of various geometries at near-critical and supercritical pressures. This book is of interest to nuclear and mechanical engineers in both industry and academia, who are concerned with the development and design of next-generation reactors, as well as engineers and technologists currently working with supercritical steam generators and power systems.

Included with this book is a free CD containing fully linked references to help readers navigate the wealth of material that is provided.