Towards a Computational Model for Heat Transfer in Electrolytic Cells

—Study of the heat transfer processes is an important component in understanding the energy balance of an electrolytic cell. Computational modeling of the heat transfer is thus necessary for electrochemical analyses. This paper describes our efforts in developing a viable computational model for heat transfer, in certain green electrolytic cells that are driven by new molten salt chemistry discovered at the George Washington University. As part of our initial efforts, we model the heat transfer in a simplified electrolytic cell, and then obtain electrical equivalent networks. Of particular interest is the heat transfer in the presence of an endothermic reaction, which prevents the use of simple lumped resistor components for the electrical counterparts. In this paper, we derive closed form solutions using both the thermal and electrical forms of the model, and demonstrate their functional equivalence. We are able to show that instead of solving a second order differential equation, the electrical equivalent model allows for numerical computation of the steady state heat flow. The electrical analogue thus sets the stage for simulation of the heat transfer on parallel computers, and also enables the model to be extended for more complex structures.