Global and Detailed Calculation of Tube Wall Temperature in a Process Furnace Steam Superheater

ABSTRACT The increasing hydrogen concentration in industrial fuels poses new challenges for the thermal and mechanical integrity of combustion equipment. Higher hydrogen content modifies combustion characteristics and heat transfer performance, affecting component lifetime. This study presents a computational framework for predicting tube wall temperatures in a steam superheater of a process furnace combusting natural gas–hydrogen blends. An iterative global heat transfer model is compared with a detailed finite‐volume‐based non‐iterative method for cross‐flow tube bundles. The results show that a suitably formulated non‐iterative method achieves accuracy comparable to iterative approaches while maintaining low computational cost, making it suitable for quick parametric studies.