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ISBN 978604821338-1
ADRIAN C.H. LAI(1), S. N. CHAN(2,a) , J. W. ER(2,b) , ADRIAN W.K. LAW(2,c) & E. ERIC ADAMS(3)
(1)
Center for Environmental Sensing and Modeling, Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology Centre, Singapore
e-mail adrian.lai@smart.mit.edu
(2)
School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
e-mail (a) SNCHAN@ntu.edu.sg; (b) JER001@e.ntu.edu.s; (c) cwklaw@ntu.edu.sg
(3)
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA
e-mail eeadams@mit.edu
ABSTRACT
We report in this paper the first study on particle plumes in a turbulent background. A jet array in which each jet was
programmed to turn on and off randomly was used to generate a roughly isotropic and homogeneous turbulence.
Particles of sizes range from 0.0675 mm to 0.725 mm were discharged continuously from a submerged hourglass to
produce steady plume flows into the turbulent background. The changes in plume mixing characteristics (comparing to
plumes in quiescent ambient) due to the effect of turbulence is reported. The breakdown of some plumes due to the
turbulence were observed and a criteria for the breaking down of plume is presented.
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initial velocity of U o 2.2 31.8 cm/s. The steadiness of homogeneity, isotropicity, integral length scale, and the
the plume efflux velocity was checked by the time-and- mean flow of the turbulence.
weight method (Chan, 2012) using different initial release
masses. The plume discharge parameters in this study are
shown in Table 1.
Experiments of particle plumes in a quiescent ambient 3.1.1 Decay of the turbulence
fluid were first carried out as reference cases. In this first
It is expected that the turbulence intensity will reduce as
series of experiments, plumes of particle size A AH (see
Table 1) were released in sequence, and the resulting the distance from the jet array x increases. Figure 2 shows
plumes were recorded at 30 Hz using a video camera. A the x rms velocity measured by using PIV at different
spotlight was used to illuminate the flows against a dark distances from the jet array. Best-fit of the data shows a
background to aid visualization. A second series of decay ~ x-1.94, somewhat faster than the reported decay of
experiments was conducted using exactly the same ~x-1.37 (Khorsandi et al., 2013) using similar apparatus; for
discharge parameters as in the first series, but with the our region of interest where the plume measurements
addition of background turbulence. Details of generating were made (x > 150 cm), the rms velocity decay as ~ x-1.58 ,
background turbulence are given in the next section. The which becomes closer to the reported decay. In our
resulting plume flow under the effect of turbulence was particle plume experiments, the measurements were
again video recorded. The captured videos were then made at 20820 cm from the jet array, with a rms velocity
converted to a series of images for post-processing. of 1.50.30 cm/s.
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Figure 5. Spatial autocorrelation function of x fluctuating velocity.
Figure 3. The ratio of rms velocity along the jet direction and that 3.2 Particle Plume
perpendicular to it at different x.
3.2.1 Quiescent ambient
uo
Fr
g[( a m ) / a ]D
If we consider the particle plume as an equivalent single-
phase plume, the only parameter governing the plume
spreading will be Fr.
0.0473Fr 0.136
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averaging sense, but this is different from the enhanced
steady spreading and should be eliminated. During
image post-processing, the centerline of the plume was
determined from each image, and any deviation of the
centerline from x = 0 was corrected so that meandering
effects could be minimized. Figure 9 shows the time-
averaged images of selected particle size plume after
post-processing.
1 / 3
~ u e ~ (Le ) 1 / 3
1/ 3
u p ~ Bo zc [3]
B
z c c1 1 / 2 ( )1 / 2
[4]
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0.5(2 / 3k 2 ) 3 / 2 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
[5]
LL This research programme/project is funded by the
National Research Foundation (NRF), Prime Ministers
where k is the turbulent kinetic energy and LL = 11.0 cm is
Office, Singapore under its Campus for Research
the integral length scale of the background turbulence.
Excellence and Technological Enterprise (CREATE)
programme.
The particle plume breakdown point in this study can be
determined by locating the position at which the plume
REFERENCES
starts to expand abruptly when compared with a
quiescent ambient. Chan SN. (2012). Mixing and Deposition of Sediment-Laden
Buoyant Jets. PhD thesis, The University of Hong
Kong.
Fischer HB, List EJ., Koh RCY., Imberger J., and Brooks
NH. (1979). Mixing in Inland and Coastal Waters.
Academic Press, 302 pp.
Figure 10. Difference in spreading with and without the effect of
turbulence (size AH).
Hubner J. (2004). Buoyant plumes in a turbulent
Using the experiments of particle plumes of size AE and environment. PhD thesis, University of Cambridge.
AH (in which the plume was shown to breakdown), we
found that the constant c 1 is about 0.1, which is in the Hunt JCR. (1994). Atmospheric Jets and Plumes. Recent
Research Advances in the Fluid Mechanics of Turbulent
same order as theoretically predicted. This suggests that
Jets and Plumes NATO ASI Series, 255, 309-334.
this can be a sound theory for plume breakdown
predictions. More experiments will be conducted in the
Khorsandi B., Gaskin S. and Mydlarski L. (2013). Effect of
future to validate the plume breakdown criteria. background turbulence on an axisymmetric turbulent
jet. Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 736, 250286.
4. CONLUSIONS
A particle plume in a turbulent background has been Lee JHW. and Chu VH. (2003). Turbulent Jets and Plumes:
studied. A roughly isotropic and homogeneous A Lagrangian Approach. Springer, 390 pp.
turbulence can be generated by a jet array with each jet
Turner JS., and Campbell IH. (1987). A laboratory and
programmed to be turned on and off randomly. A
theoretical study of the growth of "black smoker"
particle plume in quiescent ambient was found to behave
chimneys. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 82, 36-48.
rather differently than a single-phase plume: most
noticeably its spreading rate was a function of its Variano EA. and Cowen EA. (2008). A random-jet-stirred
densimetric Froude number Fr. A functional relationship turbulence tank. Journal of Fluid Mechanics, 604, 132.
between Fr and the plume spreading rate has been
established using our experimental data. The effect of Variano EA., Bodenschatz E. and Cowen EA. (2004). A
background turbulence on a particle plume was also random synthetic jet array driven turbulence tank.
studied. For plume velocity much higher than the Experiments in Fluids, 37, 613615.
turbulence velocity fluctuation, an enhanced spreading
rate of 30% was observed; for stronger turbulence, the Woods AW. (2010). Turbulent Plumes in Nature. Annual
plume begins to meander, and the plume eventually Review of Fluid Mechanics, 42, 391-412.
breakdowns when an even stronger turbulence is
experienced. A plume breakdown criteria has been
derived using the argument of Hunt (1994), and provides
an order-of-magnitude estimate of the breakdown point
in our experiments. More experiments will be conducted
in the future to develop a better understanding of the
issues arising in this paper.
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