Abstract
A chemical species transport model is developed and coupled to an improved Front-Tracking model, enabling dynamic simulation of gas-liquid mass transfer processes in dense bubbly flows.
Front-Tracking (FT) is a multiphase computational fluid dynamics technique where the location of a fluid-fluid interface is tracked via the advection of interface marker points, which make up a triangular mesh. A common drawback of FT implementations is that the volume enclosed by a mesh is not conservative during transient simulations. A remeshing technique is adopted to counteract these volume defects while keeping all physical undulations unharmed. The new remeshing procedures have been verified by comparison with results from the literature.
Species transport is modelled by a convection-diffusion equation which is discretized on a Eulerian grid, superimposed and possibly refined with respect to the grid used for the solution of the fluid flow equations. The velocity components have been interpolated to the refined grid using a higher-order solenoidal method. Enforcement of the Dirichlet condition for the concentration at the gas-liquid interface is achieved with an immersed boundary method, enabling the description of gas to liquid mass transfer. Careful validation of the newly implemented model, using synthetic benchmarks (exact solutions) and a comparison with correlations from the literature, has shown satisfactory results.
The model is used for a variety of hydrodynamic studies. In particular, the model is very suited to simulate (dense) bubbly flows due to the absence of artificial coalescence. A number of results, such as a closure of the drag force for bubbles rising in a bubble swarm and simulations of the bubble-induced turbulent energy spectra will be outlined.
The liquid side mass transfer coefficient in dense bubble swarms, with gas fractions between 4% and 40%, has been investigated using the new model. The simulations have been performed in a 3D domain with periodic boundaries, mimicking an infinite swarm of bubbles. To prevent the liquid phase to become saturated with chemical species (with the consequence of a vanishing chemical species flux due to saturation of the liquid bulk), simulations have been performed using either artificial fresh liquid inflow, or a first order chemical reaction in the liquid phase. The results indicate that the liquid-side mass transfer coefficient rises slightly with increasing gas fraction.
Front-Tracking (FT) is a multiphase computational fluid dynamics technique where the location of a fluid-fluid interface is tracked via the advection of interface marker points, which make up a triangular mesh. A common drawback of FT implementations is that the volume enclosed by a mesh is not conservative during transient simulations. A remeshing technique is adopted to counteract these volume defects while keeping all physical undulations unharmed. The new remeshing procedures have been verified by comparison with results from the literature.
Species transport is modelled by a convection-diffusion equation which is discretized on a Eulerian grid, superimposed and possibly refined with respect to the grid used for the solution of the fluid flow equations. The velocity components have been interpolated to the refined grid using a higher-order solenoidal method. Enforcement of the Dirichlet condition for the concentration at the gas-liquid interface is achieved with an immersed boundary method, enabling the description of gas to liquid mass transfer. Careful validation of the newly implemented model, using synthetic benchmarks (exact solutions) and a comparison with correlations from the literature, has shown satisfactory results.
The model is used for a variety of hydrodynamic studies. In particular, the model is very suited to simulate (dense) bubbly flows due to the absence of artificial coalescence. A number of results, such as a closure of the drag force for bubbles rising in a bubble swarm and simulations of the bubble-induced turbulent energy spectra will be outlined.
The liquid side mass transfer coefficient in dense bubble swarms, with gas fractions between 4% and 40%, has been investigated using the new model. The simulations have been performed in a 3D domain with periodic boundaries, mimicking an infinite swarm of bubbles. To prevent the liquid phase to become saturated with chemical species (with the consequence of a vanishing chemical species flux due to saturation of the liquid bulk), simulations have been performed using either artificial fresh liquid inflow, or a first order chemical reaction in the liquid phase. The results indicate that the liquid-side mass transfer coefficient rises slightly with increasing gas fraction.
| Original language | Dutch |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Progress in Applied CFD |
| Subtitle of host publication | Selected papers from 10th International Conference on Computational Fluid Dynamics in the Oil & Gas, Metallurgical and Process Industries, 17-19 June 2014, Trondheim, Norway |
| Editors | J.E. Olsen, St.T. Johansen |
| Publisher | SINTEF Academic Press |
| Pages | 59-71 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 978-82-536-1433-5 |
| ISBN (Print) | 978-82-536-1432-8 |
| Publication status | Published - 2015 |