Glass foams: formation, transport properties, and heat, mass, and radiation transfer

Abstract

Energy efficiency, environmental impact, and quality of the final product in glass manufacturing depend, to a large extent, on foams formed on the surface of the molten glass and of the batch due to entrapment of gas bubbles generated by the batch fusion and refining chemical reactions during the melting process. Hence, understanding the mechanisms of foam formation as well as development of theoretical models for thermophysical and transport properties and heat, mass, and radiation transfer in glass foams are not only a problem of significant fundamental interest but also of tremendous practical impact. In this paper, the review of the current state-of-the-art in our understanding of glass foams is provided, including some of our recent results in modeling the dynamics of the foam growth and its steady-state thickness, prediction of gas diffusion through glass foams, and thermal radiative properties of glass foams. In addition, the new results on simulation of combined conduction and radiation heat transfer in glass foams and radiative transfer in primary (batch) foams are presented and discussed in some detail. The paper also presents practical means available for reducing foaming in glass melting and concludes with the discussion of unresolved problems and summary of the directions for the future work in the area.