Radiant Gas Pipe

Radiant Gas Pipe is a radiant variant of the gas pipe used to transfer heat between the pipe and the gas moving through it. Like other radiant piping, it is meant to be run through hot or cold areas so that the contents of the pipe can absorb or release heat as they pass. A common use is routing cold gas through overheated spaces to help cool them down.

Compared with Radiant Liquid Pipe, it is generally the weaker heat exchanger. Gas pipes move only 1 kg/s of coolant, while liquid pipes move 10 kg/s, so even with identical material and coolant properties a radiant gas pipe transfers only a fraction of the heat. Gas also tends to have poorer thermal properties than liquid, so in many ordinary setups liquid cooling is more effective overall.

Even so, Radiant Gas Pipe has several important advantages. It is useful in situations where liquids would fail or be unsafe:

• Gases do not have an upper temperature limit, so high-temperature environments such as those involving Magma will not boil the coolant and damage the pipe.
• Hydrogen is especially valuable in very cold systems, since its condensation point is lower than the freezing point of every liquid other than Super Coolant. This makes it a strong choice for extreme low-temperature uses, including Liquid Oxygen production and Sour Gas processing.
• It uses half as much material as Radiant Liquid Pipe, at 25 kg per segment instead of 50 kg, which can matter when resources are tight.

Thermal conductivity of the pipe material is only part of the equation. Heat transfer with non-insulated pipes uses the average thermal conductivity of the pipe material and the gas inside it, and for most gases the coolant contribution is very small. Hydrogen is the standout exception and is usually the best gas coolant when temperature limits are not a concern. In practice, the multiplicative benefit of the radiant pipe is often reduced by the low thermal conductivity of the gas itself.

The material used for the pipe still matters. Some example values for the pipe’s thermal conductivity include:

• Aluminum Ore: 41
• Copper Ore: 9
• Gold Amalgam: 4
• Iron Ore: 8
• Niobium: 108
• Steel: 108
• Thermium: 440
• Wolframite: 30

When choosing between radiant gas and liquid piping, the decision usually comes down to the coolant. Use Radiant Gas Pipe when the system needs to tolerate extreme heat, very low temperatures, or limited material budgets. Use liquid piping when maximum heat transfer is the priority.