Investigation of CO2 capture using solid sorbents in a fluidized bed reactor: Cold flow hydrodynamics

Abstract

Both experimental tests and numerical simulations were conducted to investigate the fluidization behavior of a solid CO2 sorbent with a mean diameter of 100μm and density of about 480kg/m [3], which belongs to Geldart's Group A powder. A carefully designed fluidized bed facility was used to perform a series of experimental tests to study the flow hydrodynamics. Numerical simulations using the two-fluid model indicated that the grid resolution has a significant impact on the bed expansion and bubbling flow behavior. Due to the limited computational resource, no good grid independent results were achieved using the standard models as far as the bed expansion is concerned. In addition, all simulations tended to under-predict the bubble size substantially. Effects of various model settings including both numerical and physical parameters have been investigated with no significant improvement observed. The latest filtered sub-grid drag model was then tested in the numerical simulations. Compared to the standard drag model, the filtered drag model with two markers not only predicted reasonable bed expansion but also yielded realistic bubbling behavior. A grid sensitivity study was conducted for the filtered sub-grid model and its applicability and limitation were discussed.