[anirudh_1984]

Hallo people,

I'm having trouble figuring out if the following scenario can be allowed to exist: I have a hot stream say at 1 bar and a cold stream at 0.5 bars. Would I need to compress the hot stream to the pressure of the cold stream before contacting them in a counter-current HEX or is it possible to transfer heat between the two streams despite the pressure differential which would result at the hot/cold inlet ports of the heat exchanger?
I'm not talking about direct contacting i.e. no mixing and expanding the pressure of the cold stream isn't feasible for the process.

Thanks in advance!

Best,
AA