Computational study of bubbling fluidized bed

Abstract

Paper presented at the 6th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, South Africa, 30 June - 2 July, 2008.

This work presents a computational study of flow behaviour in a bubbling fluidized bed. The model is developed by using the commercial CFD code Fluent 6.3. The model is based on an Eulerian description of the gas and the particle phase. Different drag models are used and compared. The computational results are validated against experimental results. The experimental data are based on measurements performed by Britt Halvorsen in 2004. The dimension of the lab-scale fluidized bed is 0.25x0.25x2.00 m. The simulations are performed with spherical particles with mean particle size of 154 mm and density 2485 kg/m3. The superficial gas velocity is 0.133 m/s. Computational results are compared mutually, as well as against experimental data. The discrepancies are discussed.