Patent ID: 8776535

Claim:
A method of preventing or mitigating fog formation caused by the heating of a cryogenic fluid using an array of one or more ambient air vaporizers, said array arranged so as to define an open space at the bottom of said array of ambient air vaporizers, said array in turn having a vertically oriented containment barrier surrounding said open space, said barrier having a discharge passageway therethrough, said discharge passageway connected to an air discharge duct, said array of one or more ambient air vaporizers each comprised of a multiplicity of vertically oriented heat exchange elements, said elements in turn having tubular vertical passageways therethrough, said method comprising: a) drawing a stream of warm surrounding ambient air into said array of one or more ambient air vaporizers wherein said ambient air is a heat source, then b) passing a cryogenic fluid through said tubular vertical passageways of said multiplicity of vertically oriented heat exchange elements, thereby c) cooling said stream of warm surrounding ambient air in heat transfer relationship with said cryogenic fluid as said stream of warm surrounding ambient air falls downward through said array of one or more ambient air vaporizers, and simultaneously d) heating said cryogenic fluid in heat exchange relationship with said stream of warm surrounding ambient air, then e) exiting the cooled stream of said warm surrounding ambient air at said bottom open space of said array of one or more ambient vaporizers, and then f) collecting said cooled air stream of said warm surrounding air within said vertically oriented containment barrier surrounding said open space at said bottom of said array of one or more ambient air vaporizers, and then g) discharging said collected cooled air stream through said discharge passageway of said vertically oriented containment barrier and passing into said air discharge duct, and then h) conducting said collected cooled air stream away from said discharge passageway, wherein said discharge passageway of said barrier is fitted with one or more air discharge means or fans, and wherein said air discharge duct extends a distance which is sufficient to have the cold exit of the plume of said cooled collected air to be at a distance from the geometric center of said array of one or more ambient vaporizers equal to the solar hemisphere radius (R S ) of the solar insolation input hemisphere of said array of ambient air vaporizers and as defined by: VAPORIZER ⁢ ⁢ ARRAY ⁢ ⁢ THERMAL ⁢ ⁢ DUTY LOCAL ⁢ ⁢ DAILY ⁢ ⁢ MEAN ⁢ ⁢ OF ⁢ ⁢ TOTAL ⁢ ⁢ SOLAR ⁢ ⁢ INSOLATION = 1 2 ⁢ ( 4 ⁢ ⁢ π ⁢ ⁢ R S 2 ) .