Numerical simulation and experimental validation of the hydrodynamics in a 350 kW bubbling fluidized bed combustor

This paper presents experimentally validated three-dimensional numerical simulation of a 350 kW pilot-scale bubbling fluidized bed combustor, which has been developed by using commercial CFD software package, Fluent 14.5. The solid particle distribution has been simulated by using the multiphase Euler–Euler Approach. The gas–solid momentum exchange coefficients were calculated by using Syamlal and O’Brien drag functions. The CFD model is created as the realistic representation of the actual pilot-scale bubbling fluidized bed. All simulations are performed in transient mode for an operation time of about 350 s. The experimental study is performed with silica sand particles with mean particle size of 0.6 mm and density of 1639 kg/m3. The bed was filled with particles up to a height of 0.30 m. The same conditions are used for the simulations. The present work combines both experimental and computational studies, where the CFD-Simulation results are compared to those obtained by experiments. The predicted simulation results of minimum fluidization velocity and pressure drop values of the pilot-scale bubbling fluidized bed combustor have good agreement with the experimental measurements.

[1]  Tigabu Abrha.  Design and Development of Fast Pyrolysis Fluidized Bed Reactor for Bio-oil Production , 2011 .

[2]  Lindsay-Marie Armstrong.  CFD modelling of the gas-solid flow dynamics and thermal conversion processes in fluidised beds , 2011 .

[3]  STUDIES ON FLUIDIZATION BEHAVIOUR OF SAND AND BIOMASS MIXTURES , 2012 .

[4]  Jonas Andrew England,et al.  Numerical Modeling and Prediction of Bubbling Fluidized Beds , 2011 .

[5]  M. Azadi.  Multi-fluid Eulerian modeling of limestone particles' elutriation from a binary mixture in a gas-solid fluidized bed , 2011 .

[6]  Teklay Weldeabzgi Asegehegn,et al.  Numerical Simulation of Dense Gas-Solid Multiphase Flows Using Eulerian-Eulerian Two-Fluid Model , 2011 .

[7]  Matthias Schreiber,et al.  A comparative study of different CFD-codes for numerical simulation of gas-solid fluidized bed hydrodynamics , 2012, Comput. Chem. Eng..

[8]  Ehsan Esmaili,et al.  Adjustment of drag coefficient correlations in three dimensional CFD simulation of gas-solid bubbling fluidized bed , 2011, Adv. Eng. Softw..

[9]  M. Hamzehei.  CFD Modeling and Simulation of Hydrodynamics in a Fluidized Bed Dryer with Experimental Validation , 2011 .

[10]  F. Taghipour,et al.  Experimental and computational study of gas¿solid fluidized bed hydrodynamics , 2005 .

[11]  Rong Fan,et al.  Computational fluid dynamics simulation of fluidized bed polymerization reactors , 2006 .

[12]  N. Ellis,et al.  CFD simulation of gas–solid bubbling fluidized bed: A new method for adjusting drag law , 2009 .

[13]  Ecnica Superior,et al.  EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF A BUBBLING FLUIDIZED BED WITH A ROTATING DISTRIBUTOR , 2008 .

[14]  Lindsey C. Teaters.  A Computational Study of the Hydrodynamics of Gas-Solid Fluidized Beds , 2012 .

[15]  Teklay Weldeabzgi Asegehegn,et al.  Numerical and Experimental Investigation of Bubbling Gas–Solid Fluidized Beds with Dense Immersed Tube Bundles , 2011 .

[16]  Pranati Sahoo,et al.  A Comparative Study on Fluidization Characteristics of Coarse and Fine Particles in a Gas - Solid Fluidized Bed: CFD Analysis , 2014 .