Analysis and design of Gas-Solid centrifugal contactors based on angular momentum balance

Abstract

This thesis focuses on the study and formulation of analytical models based on angular momentum balances to support the analysis, design, and scaling of gas-solid centrifugal contactors. The angular momentum model for the Gas-Solid Vortex Reactor applied the conservation of angular momentum on a model that yields the average angular velocity of the rotating solids bed in terms of gas injection velocity, wall-solids bed drag coefficient, gas and particle properties, and chamber geometry. Three datasets from published studies, comprising 1g-Geldart B-type and D-type particles in different vortex chambers, were employed to validate the model results. Its results were found to be within 10% of the real measured values near the vicinity of the fitting point. Then, a novel elliptical blade design model was formulated for TORBED chambers. The model addressed several knowledge gaps in TORBED chamber literature, including the lack of general and precise blade design guidelines, the reliance on unphysical magnitudes such as the superficial gas velocity, and the unknown impact of new blade design variations on distributor performance. The new model demonstrated exceptional accuracy and generality compared to previous design models. Finally, an angular momentum model for TORBED chambers was derived in a similar way to the Gas-Solid Vortex Reactor. Both models are able to predict important hydrodynamic response variables, such as the solids bed angular velocity, bed thickness, and bed void fraction, in a faster, more compact, and less expensive way than typical experimental and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) methodologies.