How to Calculate Radiant Heat Loss

In layman's terms, "radiant heat" is any energy a heat source emits outward. Many objects you encounter every day emit radiant heat, from your own body to certain cooking surfaces. In order to calculate a heating surface's radiant heat loss, you must know the area of the heating surface, its "emissivity" (a value which measures its ability to emit heat by radiation) and temperatures of the heating surface and a nonheating surface next to it, such as a wall.

Things You'll Need

  • Calculator (see Resources)
  • Heating surface emissivity
Show More

Instructions

    • 1

      Convert your temperatures to Kelvin (K) if the problem you're solving doesn't provide them as such. Add 273.13 to your Celsius (C) figures to convert them to K. For example, if your problem asks you to calculate to radiant heat a 246 degrees C cooking surface loses as it emits heat toward a 24 degrees C wall, your "K" values would be 246 + 273.15 (cooking surface) and 24 + 273.15 (wall), or 519.15 K and 297.15 K, respectively.

    • 2

      Calculate the object's surface area in meters squared. For example, if the cooking surface is flat and round with a radius of 12 cm, convert the radius to meters; 1 m = 100 cm. So the example radius would be .12 m. Express its area (πr^2, where "π" is pi, approximately 3.14159, "r" is the radius and "^2" means "squared" or "to the second power") as follows: π x .12^2 = π x .0144 = .045 m^2.

    • 3

      Solve the "Radiant Heat Loss" equation, Pnet = S.B. x Ah x Eh x (Th-Ts)^4, where "S.B." is the Stephan-Boltzmann constant (5.67 x 10^-8 K^-1), "Ah" is the surface area of the heating surface, Eh is its emissivity and Th-Ts is the different in Kelvin temperatures of the heating surface and the non-heating surface. Assume that the example cooking surface has an emissivity of .96 watts per meter squared (W/m^2) and solve the equation as follows: Pnet = (5.67 x 10^-8) x .045 x .96 x (519.15 - 297.15)^4 = .0000000567 x .045 x .96 x 222^4 = 5.95 Watts.

Learnify Hub © www.0685.com All Rights Reserved