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Proceedings of
ASME TURBOEXPO 2000
May 8-11, 2000, Munich Germany

2000-GT-0320

A STEADY STATE CALCULATION MODEL FOR GAS TURBINE THERMAL

ENCLOSURES
Umberto Desideri and Francesco Di Maria
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Industriale, Universit di Perugia
Via G. Duranti 1A/4 - 06125 - Perugia, Italy
Tel. +39 0755852736-2738 - Fax +39 0755852736
e-mail: desideriu@asme.org, fdm@isten.ing.unipg.it,

ABSTRACT
Heavy duty and aeroderivative gas turbines for power
generation and mechanical drive are installed inside an
enclosure that is thermally and acoustically insulated and is
equipped with fire extinguishing systems.
The enclosure is bolted on the gas turbine basement and is
made of a steel frame that supports removable side panels,
doors and roof sections.
All the fire extinguishing systems, lubricating oil pipes and
electrical systems are fitted inside the enclosure and release,
together with the gas turbine, a large amount of heat that has to
be dissipated to avoid overheating of the gas turbine itself and
its auxiliaries. Overheating of the enclosures is one of the main
reasons for gas turbine unplanned stops.
For avoiding high internal temperatures, the enclosure is
equipped with a cooling system consisting of pipes and fans,
that extracts heat from the enclosure and limits the internal
temperature increase.
This paper presents a calculation model developed for the
study of the enclosure cooling system. Results are compared
with experimental data measured on an aeroderivative gas
turbine used as mechanical drive for a natural gas compression
station, and acceptable correspondence is achieved.
INTRODUCTION
Gas turbines are complicated machines that present many
different operating problems. Safe and reliable operation of a
gas turbine is possible if the control and monitoring of many
different variables is ensured, and all the auxiliary equipment
works perfectly. Operating conditions differing from design
point are often encountered, power output has to follow variable
loads and this may cause combustion and vibration problems.
Moreover, most aeroderivative gas turbines were designed to
operate as engines, with particular ambient conditions, which

can hardly be reproduced when they are used in mechanical or

electrical power generation.
Safety and environmental requirements also impose that the
gas turbine works in locations where it is necessary to separate
the machine from the environment. In fact, the turbine produces
a significant acoustic pollution that has to be reduced for the
safety of people who work close to the engine. Another
important issue is the reduction of the fire risk. For the above
reasons, it is necessary to separate the gas turbine from the
other components of the plant and to install it in a safe
enclosure where ventilation and a suitable temperature have to
be assured.
Generally, the enclosure also contains other devices that are
necessary to the turbine operation and that can be damaged or
disturbed by high temperatures.
The gas turbine heat rejection can be a non-negligible
fraction of its input heat and the gas turbine and its auxiliaries
contained in the enclosure have to be kept at a fixed
temperature to avoid malfunctioning and unexpected outages of
the plant.
Therefore, the enclosure is to be cooled by forced
circulation of ambient air, with a sufficient flow rate to remove
all the heat rejected by the gas turbine and its auxiliaries. The
enclosure is cooled by using one or more fans that ensure a
certain ambient air flow rate that is necessary to keep the
enclosure internal temperature under hazardous limits. Then the
cooling air is exhausted to the atmosphere.
For these reasons it is important to predict the behavior of
the enclosure cooling system at different ambient and load
conditions. In fact a good design of the enclosure cooling
system reduces the number of gas turbine outages and reduces
capital and operating costs.
This paper presents a simulation model, developed by the
authors (Di Maria, 1999a), for the calculation of enclosure

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cooling systems. The model has been validated with a real case
and calculated and experimental results have been compared.
The model presented in this paper is dedicated to
simulation of gas turbine enclosures and differs from
commercial software which calculates flow of air in ducts,
because specific components and specific circuit can be
modelled more easily. In addition, there is the possibility to
introduce the heat rejection characteristics of the gas turbine, as
a single heat input or as a curve.
Finally, most gas turbine manufacturers have proprietary
information about the auxiliary equipment that they use for the
enclosure and the model can be adapted to different components
and integrate them in the solver with the addition of simple
calculation subroutines.
NOMENCLATURE
a
A
b
c
cp
D
HR
L

m&

P
Q
R
T
w

square coefficient
section
linear coefficient
constant coefficient
specific heat at constant pressure
diameter
gas turbine heat rejection
length
mass flow rate
pressure drop
volumetric flow rate
curve radius
temperature increase
velocity
angle
specific weight
efficiency
loss correlation coefficient
friction factor

the gas turbine and all the auxiliaries that allow the engine to
work. The cooling air is ducted outside the enclosure separately
from the gas turbine exhaust gas stack.

FIGURE 1: ENCLOSURE COOLING SYSTEM

SCHEMATIC
The model described in this paper only concerns the
enclosure cooling system. In this system, the external air passes
through the filters, then is compressed by the fan, injected
inside the enclosure by several ports located in different
positions and then leaves the enclosure through the outlet ducts.
In the case studied to validate the model, the air is ducted
inside the enclosure through a number of ports, which direct the
cooling air towards specific points, which need to be cooled
(Fig. 2). Different configurations of air ports are usually
designed to optimize the cooling system of different types of
gas turbines

Subscripts
a
H
in
out
v

ambient air
hydraulic
inlet
outlet
volumetric

DESCRIPTION OF THE CALCULATION MODEL

Figure 1 shows the schematic of a typical enclosure cooling
system. It is possible to identify four main components:
Filters;
Fan;
Enclosure;
Exhaust ducts.
The filters clean the external air to prevent deposits of dust,
which might reduce the ducts flow rate and be a cause of fire
inside the enclosure. The fan pushes the amount of cooling air,
which is required to keep the internal temperature under
hazardous limits, inside the enclosure. The enclosure contains

FIGURE 2: ENCLOSURE INTERNAL DUCTS

The cooling circuit consists of many different components
that cause local and distributed pressure losses. The circuit can
be described by a certain number of branches, or components,
and nodes (Di Maria, 1999a-b; Di Maria and Desideri, 1999).
Nodes are particular circuit points where one or more branches
or components are connected together. There are three kinds of
nodes:
- internal nodes, which connect at least two branches or
components;
- inlet nodes, where the cooling air enters the circuit and
from which only one branch or component departs;
- outlet nodes, where the cooling air leaves the circuit and in
which only one branch or component arrives.

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For each component specific equations to calculate

pressure losses were considered (Idel'cik, 1986). The main
correlations are:
1) ducts pressure drop
P =

L w2

DH 2 g

(1)

2) curves pressure drop:

P =

win 2
2g

(2)

with

= 0.0175

R
DH

(3)

3) pressure drop for area enlargement:

w 2
P = in
2 g

A
1 in
Aout

2
win 2
1
0.707 1 f + 1 f 2
f
2 g

Once the air temperature increase is calculated a check on

the temperature values is done because the air maximum
temperature must be lower then the gas turbine external
temperature.
Another important issue is the mass flow rate loss. This can
occur in all circuit components. But the largest amount of air
losses takes place in the enclosure. For this reason, a volumetric
efficiency has been defined for this component as the ratio
between the amount of air that leaves the enclosure by the outlet
ducts (Fig. 1) and the amount of air that enters the enclosure.

v =

(4)

4) pressure drop for grids:

(5)

m& out
,
m& in

(11)

The calculation model operates a nodal mass balance and is

able to solve the non linear equation system that is built once
system geometry is defined and boundary conditions at inlet and
outlet nodes are given.

with
f =

Aout
.
Ain

TURBINE EXTERNAL TEMPERATURE [K]

1000

(6)

Other concentrated pressure drops are the following:

5) inlet pressure drop
P =

win 2
2g

(7)

where depends on the system geometry and in the test

case it has been assumed to be 0.5;
6) outlet pressure drop
w 2
P = in
2g

P = a Q 2 + b Q + c [Pa]

(9)

During its way in the cooling circuit, the ambient air occurs
not only in pressure changes but also in temperature changes.
Temperature is increased mainly because of the heat rejected by
the gas turbine. This heat is released by the different gas turbine
components such as the compressor, the combustion chamber
and the expander. For the gas turbine studied in the test case,
the values of the engine external temperature along its axis were
available (Fig. 3). Once the system geometry and the maximum

800
COMPRESSOR

700
600

COMBUSTION CHAMBER

500
400
300
0

(8)

where is 1 when ducts discharge directly in the

environment.
The fan has been simulated by the aid of a second degree
curve that is able to link the experimental measured values of
pressure ratio and mass flow rate.

900

EXPANDER

P =

enclosure internal temperature are known it is possible to

evaluate the amount of heat rejected by the gas turbine.
For this reason a thermal balance has been calculated
between the cooling air and the turbine rejected heat:
T c p ,a m& a = HR .
(10)

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

TURBINE AXIS [mm]

FIGURE 3: GAS TURBINE EXTERNAL TEMPERATURE

In effect the cooling circuit can be more or less
complicated depending on gas turbine model, heat rejection
characteristics and ambient conditions. For these reasons the
simulation model is able to evaluate different circuits
configurations, with two or more fan in parallel or in series,
with one or more enclosure and heat rejections curves. This will
let the designers to be able to study the main parts of the circuit
in which problems will occur and to determine the best
solutions for avoiding such problems.
Also for existing plant the aid of this model can be useful
for the solution of some plant malfunctions.

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TABLE 2: HEAT REJECTION AND ENCLOSURE

VOLUMETRIC EFFICIENCY
HR (kW)
640
100
v (%)
In figure 4 the experimental and calculated pressure of
cooling air are shown at design conditions. It is possible to note
that the maximum difference between the experimental and
calculated values is less than 1% in all plotted points.
The differences between the experimental and calculated
cooling circuit operating parameters are also represented in
table 3.
103,0

TABLE 1: AMBIENT AIR CONDITIONS

P (Pa)
101325
T (K)
308

102,0

ENCLOSURE
OUTLET

100,5

ENCLOSURE

101,0

ENCLOSURE
INLET

101,5

FAN

(12)

2) The second group of components consists of the internal

ducts (Fig. 2) that collect the cooling air in specific points of the
enclosure. Inside the enclosure air temperature increases and a
fraction of the flow rate is lost through the imperfect seals. The
ducts can be divided into different elements:
one main horizontal duct;
two vertical ducts;
three secondary horizontal ducts;
drawholes and outlet ducts.
Once the system geometry has been defined, the model is
able to calculate all the losses.
3) The third part of the system consists of the cooling air
outlet ducts that reject the air to the environment (Fig. 1). The
main elements of the cooling air outlet ducts are:
vertical ducts;
curves.
The model evaluates the concentrated pressure losses once
the geometry is defined.
In table 1 the ambient air conditions are shown.

calculated
experimental

102,5

DUCTS PRESSURE [kPa]

P = 12.8 Q 2 + 117 Q + 2209 [Pa]

data were known. Once the circuit was defined the study was
divided in two parts.
In the first part, the model was set-up by using the
experimental data. In the second part some design conditions
have been varied to study the influence of external ambient
conditions and circuit main components on the cooling system.
In table 2 the values of the heat rejection and of the enclosure
volumetric efficiency at design condition are shown.

FILTER AND
FAN INLET

MAIN ASSUMPTIONS AND CONSTRAINTS

The case study concerns an operating plant where a gas
turbine is used as a mechanical drive in a natural gas
compression station. This plant has been monitored with
temperature and pressure sensors and so experimental data are
available.
Before the geometry of the system is defined, some
assumptions have to be made about the calculation model:
1) the heat rejected by the gas turbine in the enclosure is
at constant temperature;
2) mass loss is concentrated in the enclosure;
3) cooling air is considered as ideal gas;
4) heat is transferred only in the enclosure.
Once these assumptions have been made, the second step
consists in defining a model that is able to simulate the cooling
process with acceptable precision. To this aim, the circuit has
been divided into three main groups.
1) The first group of components is represented by the
cooling air inlet system that consist of (Fig. 1):
filter,
fan,
curve.
The geometry of each component has to be defined to
calculate its pressure losses. For the fan, the second order
equation (9) was estimated as:

100,0
0

10

12

14

16

DUCTS LENGTH [m]

FIGURE 4: CALCULATED AND EXPERIMENTAL

COOLING AIR PRESSURE ALONG THE COOLING
CIRCUIT
It is possible to note that the differences between the
experimental and calculated values are always less than 1%.
The gas turbine heat rejection and the system geometry can
be considered constant in all operating conditions. Some
changes can occur in cooling system efficiency due to a
reduction in the enclosure volumetric efficiency. This can be
due to obsolete materials or wear of seals in the doors and
removable panels of the enclosure. Cooling system performance
is also affected by changes in ambient temperature.

TEST CASE ANALYSIS

The model was tested with a gas turbine utilized as
mechanical drive and for which the geometrical and operating

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TABLE 3: CALCULATED AND EXPERIMENTAL

RESULTS
Parameters Exper. Value Calc. Value
Difference
Mass flow
11.3 (kg/s) 11.25 (kg/s)
0.44 (%)
Outlet
363 (K)
362.8 (K)
0.05 (%)
Temp
2152 (Pa)
2159 (Pa)
0.3 (%)
Fan P

It is also possible to note a slight increase in maximum

circuit pressure as Tamb decreases, for each v value. The
increase in cooling air density at inlet of the systems causes an
increase in circuit global pressure losses with a reduction in
volumetric flow rate through the fan. However, even in the
volume flow rate decreases, the higher density lets the mass
flow rate increase.
103,0

10

12

14

101,5
101,0
100,5
100,0

100,0
0

102,0

16

DUCTS LENGTH [m]

363
362

Tamb=303.2 [K]

v=100(%) =95(%)
v

361

v=90(%)
v=80(%)

12

v=80(%)

Tout [K]

358

101,5

357
356

v=95(%)

v=80(%)

ENCLOSURE
OUTLET

ENCLOSURE

ENCLOSURE
INLET

FAN

354
353

10

12

14

351
350

11,2

16

11,3

11,4

v=90(%) =85(%)
v

11,5

11,6

v=80(%)

11,7

INLET MASS FLOW RATE [kg/s]

DUCTS LENGTH [m]

FIGURE 8: ENCLOSURE OUTLET TEMPERATURE

AND INLET MASS FLOW RATE FOR DIFFERENT v
AND AMBIENT TEMPERATURE

FIGURE 6: INFLUENCE OF ENCLOSURE

VOLUMETRIC EFFICIENCY ON COOLING CIRCUIT
PRESSURE AT Tamb=303.2 K
Figures 5 to 7 show the effect of v and Tamb on pressure
inside the cooling system. As the enclosure volumetric
efficiency decreases, for each Tamb value, there is a reduction of
pressure due to a reduction in fan pressure ratio. In fact, as the
volumetric efficiency increases, there is a reduction in the mass
flow rate through the enclosure exhaust ducts (Fig. 1). This
lowers the cooling system global pressure losses but increases
the mass flow rate that the fan introduces into the circuit.

v=100(%) =95(%)
v

352

100,0
0

v=85(%)

v=100(%) =90(%)
v

355

100,5

16

T amb=308.2 (K)
T amb=303.2 (K)
T amb=298.2 (K)

359

101,0

14

v=85(%)
v=90(%)

360

102,0

FILTER AND
FAN INLET

DUCTS PRESSURE [kPa]

10

FIGURE 7: INFLUENCE OF ENCLOSURE

VOLUMETRIC EFFICIENCY ON COOLING CIRCUIT
PRESSURE AT Tamb=298.2 K

103,0
102,5

DUCTS LENGTH [m]

FIGURE 5: INFLUENCE OF ENCLOSURE

VOLUMETRIC EFFICIENCY ON COOLING CIRCUIT
PRESSURE AT Tamb=308.2 K

v=100(%)

ENCLOSURE

ENCLOSURE
OUTLET

ENCLOSURE

100,5

ENCLOSURE
INLET

101,0

FAN

101,5

v=80(%)

FILTER AND
FAN INLET

DUCTS PRESSURE [kPa]

102,0

FILTER AND
FAN INLET

DUCTS PRESSURE [kPa]

v=80(%)

Tamb=298.2 [K]

v=90(%)

102,5

ENCLOSURE
INLET

v=90(%)

102,5

v=100(%)

Tamb=308.2 [K]

FAN

v=100(%)

ENCLOSURE
OUTLET

103,0

Figure 8 shows the cooling air outlet temperature from the

enclosure for different volumetric efficiencies and ambient
temperatures. There is a reduction in outlet temperature both
with volumetric efficiency and with ambient air temperature.
The volumetric efficiency has a smaller effect than the ambient
temperature, and it is mainly due to the reduction of the speed
through the exhaust ducts of the enclosure.

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CONCLUSIONS
The model for design point and performance of gas turbine
enclosures presented in this paper allows a detailed calculation
of the main components of the cooling system.
The heat rejection from the gas turbine is input to the
model, and has to be known to describe completely the cooling
system. All the possible elements constituting the cooling
circuit can be modeled and assembled freely. The software code
implementing the model is now being completed with a friendly
user interface, which allows to place single elements on a blank
sheet and connect their input and output ports with simple
operations.
The software is under test with several aeroderivative and
heavy duty gas turbine configurations.
The model is a useful tool to study the performance of gas
turbine enclosures when located in different ambient conditions,
and different loads both at design and operating conditions.
REFERENCES
Di Maria, F., 1999a," Impianti di conversione energetica ad
alta efficienza di tipo non convenzionale con turbina a gas",
Ph.D. Thesis (in Italian).
Di Maria, F., 1999b, "Design and off-design, pipe network
geothermal power plant analysis with power pipe simulator",
Energy Conversion and Management, accepted for publication.
Di Maria, F., Desisderi, U., 1999, "A simulation code for
single phase geothermal fields", Proceedings of the Winter
Annual Meeting, Nashville, November, 14-19.
Idel'cik, E., I., 1986,"Memento des pertes de charge",
Editions Eyrolles, Paris.

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