Thermophysical properties of seawater

Description

This page provides tables and a library of computational routines for the thermophysical properties of seawater including:

Density
Specific heat capacity
Latent heat of vaporization
Thermal conductivity
Dynamic viscosity
Surface tension
Vapor pressure
Boiling point elevation
Specific enthalpy
Specific entropy
Specific Gibbs energy
Specific flow exergy
Osmotic coefficient
Chemical potential of water in seawater
Chemical potential of salts in seawater
Thermal diffusivity
Specific internal energy
Kinematic viscosity
Prandtl number
Specific volume

These properties are those needed for design of thermal and membrane desalination processes. They are given as functions of temperature and salinity. The pressure is taken as atmospheric pressure (0.1 MPa) up to the saturation temperature and at saturation pressure for higher temperatures. The temperature and salinity ranges are 0 - 120 degC and 0 - 120 g/kg respectively.

Details about the source, validity and accuracy of each property function can be found in:
Mostafa H. Sharqawy, John H. Lienhard V, and Syed M. Zubair, "Thermophysical properties of seawater: A review of existing correlations and data," Desalination and Water Treatment, Vol. 16, pp.354-380, April 2010. (PDF file) Includes corrections through July 2012.

The seawater properties library routines are available in MATLAB, EES, and JACOBIAN formats. They are a self contained library and are extremely easy to use. They will run on all computers that support MATLAB, EES, or JACOBIAN.

This software is provided "as is" without warranty of any kind. See the file sw_copy.m for conditions of use and licence.

Downloads

Tables of properties in pdf format (Version: 19 March 2010)
MATLAB files in a zip archive (Version: 17 July 2012)
EES library file in a zip archive (Version: 26 April 2011)
JACOBIAN file (Version: 25 July 2011)
(Journal paper describing the correlations) Includes corrections through July 2012.

Installation

For MATLAB:

Place all the MATLAB m files in a directory called "Seawater"
Add this folder to the MATLAB search path. See the MATLAB command "help path" for more details.

For EES:

Place the files SEAWATER_EES.LIB and SEWATER_EES.CHM in a directory called "Seawater"
Place this folder inside the Userlib folder of EES. See the EES library routines for usage of the properties functions.

Property Functions

Property (unit)	Temperature, T (degC)	Salinity, S (g/kg)	Function name
Density (kg/m³)	0 - 180	0 - 160	SW_Density(T,S)
Specific heat capacity (J/kg.K)	0 - 180	0 - 180	SW_SpcHeat(T,S)
Thermal conductivity (W/m.K)	0 - 180	0 - 160	SW_Conductivity(T,S)
Dynamic viscosity (kg/m.s)	0 - 180	0 - 150	SW_Viscosity(T,S)
Surface tension (N/m)	0 - 40	0 - 40	SW_SurfaceTension(T,S)
Vapor pressure (kPa)	0 - 200	0 - 240	SW_Psat(T,S)
Boiling point elevation (K)	0 - 200	0 - 120	SW_BPE(T,S)
Latent heat of vaporization (J/kg)	0 - 200	0 - 240	SW_LatentHeat(T,S)
Specific enthalpy (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	SW_Enthalpy(T,S)
Specific entropy (J/kg.K)	10 - 120	0 - 120	SW_Entropy(T,S)
Specific Gibbs energy (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	SW_Gibbs(T,S)
Specific flow exergy (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	SW_Exergy(T,S,T0,S0)^*
Osmotic coefficient	0 - 200	10 - 120	SW_Osmotic(T,S)
Chemical potential of water (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	ChemPot_W(T,S)
Chemical potential of salts (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	ChemPot_S(T,S)
Thermal diffusivity (m²/s)	0 - 180	0 - 160	SW_Diffusivity(T,S)
Specific internal energy (J/kg)	10 - 120	0 - 120	SW_IntEnergy(T,S)
Kinematic viscosity (m²/s)	0 - 180	0 - 150	SW_Kviscosity(T,S)
Prandtl number	0 - 180	0 - 150	SW_Prandtl(T,S)
Specific volume (m³/kg)	0 - 180	0 - 160	SW_Volume(T,S)

^*T0 and S0 are reference temperature and salinity, the default is T0 = 25 degC and S0 = 35 g/kg