Kick-Off Report

Effects of wire mesh on hydrodynamics and mass transfer in reactive

bubbly flows

By
Satish Kamath (0868860)

1 Introduction
Bubble columns are used in a variety of industrial processes including large-scale production
of base chemicals and synthetic fuels. The gas phase has to dissolve in the liquid phase and
then react with the reactants in the liquid phase. Therefore the resistances involved are: mass
transfer resistance from gas to liquid and intrinsic kinetic limitations of the reaction itself.
Unlike mass transfer limitations, kinetic limitations usually are hard to deal with because
there are very less parameters which have a considerable effect on kinetics of the reaction.
In bubble columns hydrodynamics influences the bubble size, the amount of mixing in the
liquid phase. Bubble size has an effect on interfacial area between the two phases. Therefore
both these parameters influence mass transfer between the gas and liquid phase. The chemical
reaction enhances the mass transfer. Therefore all these parameters become important and
need to be checked and also if possible optimized to get maximum conversion.
Bubbles have a tendency to coalesce in the column to give larger bubbles. Smaller the bubble
size larger the interfacial area and larger the mass transfer rate. Therefore to decrease bubble
size, a wire mesh at intermediate stages is proposed to cut the bubbles into smaller bubbles.
The model reaction for the experiments is chemisorption of CO2 with NaOH.
Discrete Bubble Model (DBM) is used to model the system hydrodynamics. A species
balance is also solved to account for all the components of the system. Coalescence of
bubbles is taken into account.
2

Project Goals

2.1 Experiment
The experiments will be performed in 2 sets: One with the wire mesh and another without
wire mesh for comparison. Each set will be for 1 pH value and 5 different initial gas
velocities. Another set of experiments will be performed on dodecane-Nitrogen system
without reaction.
The goals of experiments are listed below.

Perform Chemisorption experiments in a model 2D bubble column and capture

hydrodynamic parameters:
1. Internal Gas hold up
2. Bubble size
3. pH measurement
4. Time averaged bubble and liquid velocity profiles
Analyze flow structures and bubble plume dynamics.

2.2 Simulation
Correspondingly simulations will also be performed with the experiments. The goals of
performing simulations are listed below.

To verify the following parameters from experiments:

1. average velocity profiles (liquid and bubble)

2. the flow structures
3. bubble plume dynamics
4. pH (via concentration profiles)
5. Average internal gas hold-up
3 Literature Study
3.1 Experimental Setup
The experiments are carried out in a laboratory scale bubble column. A pseudo-2D geometry
is chosen to enable visualization of flow structures. The bubbles are introduced into the
column using a gas flow rate. The gas phase is fed into the column via different channels,
which are individually controlled by mass flow controllers. There are in total 15 needles at
the bottom plate of the column. At the top part a pH meter, temperature sensor and a gas flow
meter are available to measure all relevant quantities during the experiments [1].

The bubble velocity is measured through Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV). With PIV, the
column is illuminated from behind to obtain high contrast images of shadows of bubbles
against a bright liquid background. A high speed camera is used to record the images. Two
subsequent images of the flow with a short delay time of are divided into small
interrogation areas. The volume averaged displacement of the bubble images between the
interrogation areas in the first and the second image is determined by means of crosscorrelation analysis.
For measuring gas hold-up in the reactor the height of the free surface of the liquid with and
without aeration is used.
The bubble size measured by means of image analysis technique. In this the bubble size
measurement software uses an algorithm to identify and measure the bubble size based on the
intensity map of the image. A gray scale threshold is set to distinguish bubbles from the
background liquid. The software cannot detect bubbles which are smaller than a particular
size. Also there may be overlapping bubbles in the image which are resolved using the
technique described in Lau et al [2].
3.2 Simulation
Discrete Bubble Model (DBM) is used to model the hydrodynamics of the system. This
model represents Euler-Lagrangian model. The bubbles are tracked and liquid phase is
treated as a continuum. The momentum balance is performed on the bubble using the Newton
equations of motion. For an incompressible bubble:

( )
= ( )

(1)

= (
)

(2)

The forces considered on the bubble are due to gravity, local pressure gradients, liquid drag,
lift forces and virtual mass forces. Closure for quantification of these forces is given in work
of Delnoij et al [3]. Liquid phase hydrodynamics is represented by volume averaged NavierStokes equation which consists of continuity and momentum equations. in the equation
represents the liquid fraction and represents the rate of mass transfer.
( )
+ . = ( )

(3)

( )
+ . = . + +

(4)

Where represents the forces on the liquid due to the bubbles. and are most important
parameters of the model. The liquid phase flow is assumed to be Newtonian.
For components present in the system 1 species balances have to be solved
simultaneously. The fraction of last component can be derived from the overall mass balance.
( )

+ . ( ( )) = ( ) +

(5)

is the source term accounting for the generation or disappearance of specie due to
chemical reaction. The mass transfer rate for the bubble is calculated incorporating the
enhancement factor. The coefficient is calculated through Sherwood number correlation.
The interphase coupling is very important for the closure of above equations. Euler to
Lagrange and vice versa mapping function is used to calculate quantities at required
positions. The mapping function is a fourth order polynomial proposed by Deen et al [4].
To resolve the time dependent motion of the bubble and liquid phases, DBM employs 3
different time scales. is the largest time step used to solve the liquid phase flow field
taking into account interphase coupling. The flow time step is divided into a fixed number of
smaller bubble time steps during which forces on bubble is calculated. This is divided
into even smaller time steps during which bubble-bubble interaction and bubble-wall
interaction is taken into account.
The model also accounts for coalescence of bubbles based on model proposed by
Sommerfeld et al [5]. Coalescence is incorporated by directly comparing the contact time
with the film drainage time. The collision time is determined by the relation reported by
Allen and Tildesley [6]. Film drainage time for coalescence to occur is calculated based on
the model of Prince and Blanch [7]. The contact time of the bubble is calculated assuming
that it is directly proportional to deformation distance divided by normal component of the
velocity. When the contact time is less than the film breakage time coalescence does not

occur and they will simply bounce. Otherwise, they coalesce and new properties of bubbles
are decided by certain rules.
Apart from coalescence the break-up of bubbles may also take place. Break-up occurs if the
inertial (deformation) force exceeds the surface tension that is supposed to bring the bubble
back to its spherical shape. Therefore the Weber number should exceed a particular critical
value. Based on this model a binary break up model is considered. Bigger daughter bubble is
placed at the position of the parent bubble and the smallest one is placed randomly around the
centroid of the bigger bubble. [8]
A wire mesh is also placed in the middle of the columns to cut the bubbles. The bubble
distance (normalized to its pitch) from the wire mesh is checked first. If it is within a cut-off
distance and also that the bubble is larger by a certain factor compared to the pitch of the
wire-mesh, then the cutting is activated. If the bubble is smaller than 2 times the pitch then no
residual bubble wont be considered otherwise a residual bubble is considered along with the
daughter bubbles. The position of the residual is same as that of the parent bubble. The new
positions of the daughter bubbles are at the center of the wire in x and y direction and slightly
adjusted at the extremes. New velocities are also assigned to all bubbles. The x and y
direction velocities are same as that of parent bubble but in z direction it is assigned to 0. [9]

References

[1] D. Darmana, On the Multiscale Modelling of Hydrodynamics, Mass Transfer and

Chemical Reactions in Bubble Columns, 2006.
[2] Y. M. Lau, N. G. Deen and J. A. M. Kuipers, "Development of an image measurement
technique for size distribution in bubbly flows," Chemical Engineering Science, pp. 2029, 2013.
[3] E. Delnoij, F. Lammers, J. Kuipers and W. van Swaaji, "Dynamic simulation of dispersed
gas-liquid two phase flow using a discrete bubble model," Chemical Engineering Science,
pp. 1429-1458, 1997.
[4] N. Deen, M. van Sint Annaland and J. Kuipers, "Multi-scale modeling of dispersed gasliquid two-phase flow," Chemical Engineering Science, pp. 1853-1861, 2004.
[5] M. Sommerfeld, E. Bourloutski and D. Broder, "Euler/Lagrange calculations of bubbly
flows with consideration of coalescence," The Canadian Journal of Chemical
Engineering, vol. 81, pp. 508-518, 2003.
[6] M. Allen and D. Tildesley, Computer Simulation of Liquids, Oxford Science
Publications, 1987.
[7] M. Prince and B. H.W., "Bubble coalescence and break up in air sparged bubble
columns," AIChE Journal, vol. 36, pp. 1485-1499, 1990.
[8] Y. M. Lau, Coalescence and break-up in dense bubbly flows, 2013.
[9] D. Jain, Y. Lau, J. Kuipers and N. Deen, "Discrete bubble modeling for a microstructured bubble column," Chemical Engineering Science, vol. 100, pp. 496-505, 2013.

ID
1

Task
Mode

2
3

4
5
6

Project: Project1
Date: Fri 04-07-14

Task Name

Duration

Start

Finish
09-06

CO2Chemisorption
Experimentswithout
wiremesh
Simulationofabove
experiments
CO2Chemisorption
Experimentswith
wiremesh
Simulationofabove
experiments
MidTerm
Presentation
Dodecane
Experiments

7.6wks

Wed
160714

Fri031014

9wks

Mon
140714
Mon
080914

Fri101014

Mon
150914
Mon
201014
Mon
201014

Fri171014

5wks

5wks
0.2wks
3wks

01 July
23-06

07-07

21-07

01 August
04-08

18-08

01 September
01-09

15-09

01 October
29-09

Fri101014

Mon
201014
Fri071114

Task

Project Summary

Manual Task

Start-only

Deadline

Split

Inactive Task

Duration-only

Finish-only

Progress

Milestone

Inactive Milestone

Manual Summary Rollup

External Tasks

Manual Progress

Summary

Inactive Summary

Manual Summary

External Milestone

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01 November
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