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U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Erosion calculations in a two-dimensional fluidized bed

Conference ·
OSTI ID:6336751

Erosion in fluidized-bed combustors, a nearly commercial means of burning coal cleanly, has surfaced as a serious issue that may negatively affect their economics. The evidence suggests that the key to understanding this erosion is detailed knowledge of the coupled and complex phenomena of solids circulation and bubble motion. The FLUFIX computer code has been developed for this purpose. Computed hydrodynamic results compare well with limited experimental data (including the bubble frequency and size and the time-averaged porosity distribution) taken in a thin two-dimensional rectangular fluidized bed containing a rectangular obstacle. The monolayer energy dissipation erosion model is developed and shown to generalize the so-called power dissipation erosion model used successfully to analyze slurry jet pump erosion. The computed transient and time-averaged transient energy dissipation rates for the monolayer energy dissipation and Finnie erosion models are compared. The computed erosion rates are compared with each other and with available literature erosion data to validate the calculations. The results are in reasonable agreement. More erosion experiments are needed to further validate the computations. 29 refs.

Research Organization:
Argonne National Lab., IL (USA); Illinois Inst. of Tech., Chicago (USA). Dept. of Chemical Engineering
DOE Contract Number:
W-31109-ENG-38
OSTI ID:
6336751
Report Number(s):
CONF-870540-2; ON: DE87011419
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English