Chinese J. Chem. Bng., 12 (8) 610 ~ 614 (2004) Numerical Study of Solid-Liquid Two-Phase Flow in Stirred Tanks with Rushton Impeller (Il) Prediction of Critical Impeller Speed* WANG Feng(z#)*", MAO Zaisha(£ #%)°"* and SHEN Xiangqian( it, #%4)° * Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sclences, Belling 100080, Chi Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100039, China © Changsha Research Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, Changsha 410012, China Abstract The critical impeller speed, js, for complete suspension of solid pastcles in the agitated solid-iquid two-phase system in baflled stirred tanks with a standard Rushton impeller is predicted sing the computational procedure propered in Part I. Thre different numerical criteria ate tested for determining the sical eatid suspen Sion. The predicted 13s is compared with those obtained from several empirical correlations. It is suggested the ‘moet reasonable eriteion for determining 1 complete suspension of solid particles i the positive sign of simulated ‘axial velocity of solid phase at the location where the solid particles are most dificult to be suspended, Keywor: 1 INTRODUCTION ‘The main purpose of the widely used agitated ves. sels for solid-liquid two-phase systems in process in- dustry is to enhance the heat and mass transfer be- ‘oven two phases. An important aspect in designing and optimizing the solid-liquid stirred reactor is the complete suspension of solid particles off the bottom of the vessel, at which point all of the particles are in motion, all the solid surface are available for mass and heat transfer and all the sold particles may be tully utilized. The impeller speed corresponding to this sta- tus is referred as the critical impeller speed, Njs. Fur- ther increasing the impeller speed, the transport rate between two phases will increase only marginally. Considerable attention has been devoted to deter- ‘mine the critical impeller speed in the past. The pio- cering work conducted by Zwietering!” is considered the most systematic investigation even viewed nowa- days. By visual observation of the solid particle mo- tion on the stirred tank floor, he defined the complete suspension state of solid particles as all particles are in motion and no particle remains on the floor for more than 1s to 2s. An empirical correlation of the Nis was proposed as i, YEiamels *(9Ap/ Pe) XO1 Nis = S- oe a where $ is a dimensionless parameter defined as a funetion of the tank configuration and the impeller expe at =1(5:8) 2) Received 2003-11-12, accepted 2004-07-05. sticred tank, slid-liquid flow, critical impeller speed, solid suspension, numerical simulation and it can be obtained from the graphical function of T/D and T/C as proposed by Zwietering!) ‘The work of Armenante et all?! was focused on the effects of impeller clearance off the tank bottom on Nys. The correlation for Rushton impeller for C/D > 1/5 is oe -3.06 (7) exp (oa) 008 x0294020, ain =a00 (2) ap (04s) o-oo inn (222 ’ . ®) Another approach to determine the critical im- peller speed is to investigate the solid concentration profile variation with the impeller speed!*®), Tt was found that more solid particles will be suspended and the solid concentration will increase as the impeller speed is increased gradually. When the critical im- peller speed is reached, few solid particles can be added to the bulk liquid flow. Further inerease of the impeller speed will result in the homogenization of the suspension and the solid concentration will de- «crease in some locations. In other position, there will only a change in the slope of the plat of the solid cone centration against the impeller speed, Baldi et at introduced a theoretical model to de- termine jg based on the assumption that the energy needed to suspend solid particles is proportional to that of turbulent vortices. Another theoretical model ‘was proposed by Wichterlel”) based on the balance between the upward flow velocity and the particle set ting velocity. + Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 20008016, No. 20236050 and No.60134020), "7 "To whom correspondence should be addressedNumerical Study of Solid-Liquid Two-Phase Flow in Stirred Tanks with Rushton Impeller (I) 611 No investigation has been conducted on predict- ing the critical impeller speed using computational fluid dynamics techniques although they have been popularly adopted to sirmulate the flow field in stirred tanks®-™l, In this article, the computational proce- dure proposed in Part I" is employed to simulate the solid-liquid flow in stirred tanks and find the criterion for predicting the critical impeller speed. 2 MATHEMATICAL MODEL ‘The mathematical model is the same as the proce- dure proposed in Part [44], 3 NUMERICAL METHODOLOGY ‘The numerical methodology is the same as that in Pact 1) 4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The critical impeller speed for three operation cases\!213) gs listed in Table 1 is the target to be ab- tained from the numerical simulation. During the sim- ulation runs, the impeller speed was increased at simall interval till it became well above Nis. ‘Table 1 Operation conditions Cues Gaab Cave T 0.204 0380 0.30 a 0.204 0.30 0.30 D 1/3 1/3 Ts © Tp 1/3 Ts Nw 300 798 798 & 1000 1000 1000 i 2050 2360 2380 a 2325 S70 Bro ene 0.05% 3% 20% 4.1 Criterion 1 A criterion is needed to determine Nys from the numerical results. An index proposed by Bourne and Sharmal is adopted. By inspecting the solid concen- tration profiles at a specific monitor point against the varying impeller speods, Nys is defined as the impeller speed corresponding to the peak concentration or that where a sudden change in the slope of the profile oc- The effects of monitor point on the prediction of tical iapeller speed are shown in Fig. 1 be observed from Fig. 1(a) that the variation of solid concentration against the impeller speed is similar at different radial locations and the same Nys will be achieved. However, the solid concentration profiles at different axial location are much different as shown in Fig. 1(b). It is observed that the solid concentration elow the impeller plane (=/H = 0.2) shows a peak Te can, with the increasing impeller speed, while the profile shows a slope change for a location above the impeller (:/H = 0.8). The reasonable explanation may be that as the impeller speed increases, the local solid concen- tration will also increase due to more solid particles become suspended. When Njs is reached, no more solid particles can be added to the bulk liquid flow, and further increase of the impeller speed just makes the phase dispersion more homogeneous. Therefore, the solid concentration at the location near the bottom of the tank will decrease and a peak concentration oc- curs while the concentration near the top surface will continuously increase with only a slope change in the plot of concentration versus Njs. ‘The result shown in Fig. 1 suggests that Njs is quite independent of the location of monitor point. ahah oF (s) 2/H =02 s/R: We 05; — 07; 09 20 ‘ea 16 ise eo F os| sin aor 360 () /R=07 5/M: 0.2; — 05; 08 Effects of location of monitor point on the simulation results of Nas Figure 1 Figure 2 shows the Nys determined by inspecting the local solid concentration profile against impeller speed at a specifie location for three operation cases It is observed that the predicted Nis is 350r-min for Case a, 485rmin-! for Case b and 650r:min“? for Case ¢. It should be noted the monitor point for Case c is different from the other cases for the rea- son of its high average concentration. The results are all lower than those calculated from empirical corre- lations listed in Table 2. However, it is suagested by Nienow!"] that the final solids to be suspended came from tiny heaps of particles on the bottom of the Chinese J. Ch. B. 12 (5) 610 (2004)612 Chinese J. Ch. E, (Vol. 12, No.8) stirred tank, and the experimental investigation con- ducted by Rieger and Ditll) also verified that Njs determined From ahserving the variation of concen tration of solid phase against the impeller speed was always lower than that given by the empirical correla- tions and it was not suitable for determining the crit- ical suspension impeller speed. Although Criterion 1 tends to give lower impeller speed, it may be used in cases that the visual observation method is not appli- cable for determining the critical impeller speed. 1 1 ¢ Ns § aa oe 20, 30 0 Nem (a) Case a 2/1 =02, "1 20 sd Nee 8 rr og , bo —3io alo —st0— ator (©) Cae b S/H 302, 1f = 03 16 £ od od Baio ath Neemiat (6) Case 6 3/1 204, 1/R=07 Figure 2 Prediction of Ns for complete of solid particles 4.2 Criterion 2 ‘The second criterion to determine Nys is to in- spect the axial velocity of solid phase, ue.2, in cells closest to Ue Luk buttons at different impeller speed It was shown in the caleulated result of Part I!) that ‘October, 2004 the solid particles tend to accumulate at the center of the tank bottom for the solid-liquid stireed sys- tem with « standard Rushton impeller, which was also verified by mumerical simulation('®) and experi= mental investigations|"'"47151, It is reasonable to be- lieve that when ug.» of the cells at the center of the tank floor is finitely positive, the rest solid particles at the whole flow will be suspended, because the liquid flow at the bottom is from the side wall to the een- ter, which is thus the most difficult point for particle suspension. ‘The radial profiles of u,,. of cells next to the tank bottom at different impeller speeds are shown in Fig.3. It is easily to observe when the impeller 005 90s 81s (©) Case b 00; = =~ 400; - 00: ors 02s 005 M: Figure 8 Axial velocity of solid phase corresponding to different impeller speedsNumerical Study of Solid-Liquid ‘Lwo-Phase Flow in Stirred ‘Tanks with Rushton Impeller (Il) 613 (a) N= 828r-min~! Figure 4 Vector Plots of axial velocity of solid phaso for Caso b with different impeller speed speed is low, tus in a fairly large region in the vicinity of the tank floor center is negative, implying that the solid particles will settle down at low impeller speed. As the impeller speed increase, tank bottom will decrease in ma tthe center of the wenitude, and event ally becomes zero, which means a critical status of solid particles. Purther increasing the impeller speed, us» becomes positive, indicating the solid particles are suspended. The vector plot for Case b is shown in Fig.4. The results from this criterion agree with those obtained from empirical correlation. It is rea- sonable since the criterion is identical to the definition of Zwietering! 4.3 Criterion 3 Since the solid particles are apt to deposit at the center of tank floor, it is possible to obtain Nis by inspecting the variation of solid concentration against ‘the impeller speed at this position. This is the third criterion for determination of Nys. To apply this method, the solid concentration profiles at the cells closest to the tank bottom are plotted and shown in Fig 5. It is observed when the smpeller speed 1s low, ° vs 1S (a) Case a Ni: — 180; ~ ~~ 250 200; ~~ 400; -- 4805, 20285 08; oT Ts N Figure § Solid concentration corresponding to different impeller speed at = 0 the solid concentration at a fairly large region close to the tank bottom is much higher, indicating pos- sible sedimentation of solid particles. Por the cases with high average solid concentration such as Cases b and c, the solid concentration at this position will reach 0.6, almost the maximum solid packing limit for mono-dispersed spherical particles, Increasing the Chinese J. Ch. B. 12 (6) 610 (2004)ou Chinese J. Ch. B. (Vol: 12, No.5) impeller speed will lead to the decrease of solid con- centration, at first in the regions far from the center and then the bottom center. The values of Nig by this criterion are listed in Table 2 as well. For the same reason as Criterion 2, the results agree well with those from empirical correlations. It is worthwhile to note the results from Criterion 3 are the same as those from Criterion 2 since the physical significance of these two criteria is identical to each other. However, there is some subjectivity in defining the solid concentration corresponding precisely to the suspension of solids. So the application of Criterion 3 is not as straightforward fs Criterion 2. The results by Criteria 2 and 3 are both somewhat lower than the empirical correlations obtained from visual observation for the reason that the visual method will always give higher results than reality! ‘Table 2 Comparison of N3s calculated with results from correlations Tasca Gaeb Omee “Gwietering’s Ba. (I) 425 555 TT Armenonte’s Eq.(3) 472 oot 808 on 1 350 485 380 Criterion 2 a 562 ear om 2 a0. a 6x7 5 CONCLUSIONS In this work, the critical impeller speed Nys for the complete suspension of solid particles in baffled stirred tank with standard Rushton impeller is nu- merically predicted using the computational proce- dure proposed in Part I!!4] Three numerical crite- ria give different predicted critical impeller speeds but they are in reasonable agreement with the prediction using empirical correlations. It is recommended to use Criterion 2 to determine Nis by examining the solid velocity at the bottom center where the solid particles, are easy to accumulate and difficult to be suspended. NOMENCLATURE, © clearance of impeller center plane to tank bottonn, sn Cy, clearance of impeller bottom to tank bottom (Gy =C—w/2},m diameter of impeller, m ameter of solid particle, um gravity acceleration, ms"? Iheight of liquid in tired tank, Impeller speed, r-min* raul of stirred tan, m tadial coordinate, mn dimensionless constant diameter of stirred tank, m sean velocity component, ms-* width of blade, m solid mass percentage, gg" x 100 axial coordinate starting from the tank bottom, m phase concentration Viscosity, Pass Kinematic viscosity, mar? SEO UKE e Ua REREAD October, 2004 density, kgm Subscripts fv averaged © tiga phase 3S just suspended Tam Taminar solid phase sim simulation result REFERENCES 1 Zwietering, T-X., “Suspending of solid particles in liquid by agiaiors", Chem. Big. Sei, 8, 244299 (1958). 2 Armenante, PM., Nagamine, B-U., Susanto, J., “Deter rmination of cortelations to predict the minimum agitation speed for complete tolid stspension in agitated veesa Can. J. Chem. Eng., 76, 413—419 (1998). 3 Armenante, PM., Nagamine, E.U., “Elect of low off bottom impeller clearance on the minimum agitation speed for complete suspension in stired tanks", Chem. ng. Si, 8, 1767—1776 (1908). 4 Reiger, F, Dit, P,, Herclhove, O., uspension of slid por- ticles concentration profiles and particle ayer on the veel bottom", In: 6th Buropean Conference on Mixing, Pavia, Italy, 251—258 (1088), 5 Bourne, J.R., Sharina, R.N., “Suspension characteristics of solid particles in propeller agitated tanks”, In: Ist Eur ropean Conference on Mixing, and Centrifugal Separation, Cambridge, BHRA, Cranfield, UK, BS, 25—39 (1978) 6 Baldi, G., Cont, R., Alaria, E., “Complete suspension of particles in mechanically agitated verse’, Chom. Bug Sci 38, 21—25 (1978). 7 Wichterle, K., “Conditions for suepension of solids in agi- tated vessels", Chem. Eng. Sci, 43, 467—471 (1988), 8 Gosman, A.D., Is, Ril, Lekakou,C., Looney, MK Poli tis, S., “Multidimensional modeling of turbulent two-phase ows in stirred vessels", AICHE J., 38, 10461056 (1002) 9 Micale, G., Montante, C., Grisaf, P., Brucato, A., God: feey, J, “CFD simulation of particle distribution in stirred votcole". Trane, IchemE., 78, 435-443 (2000), 10 Montanie, G., Micale,G., Magelli,F., Brucato, A., “Exper- iments andl CFD predictions of solid particle distribution in a vessel agitated with pitched blade turbines", Trans chem, 79, 1005—1010 (2001). U1 Wang, F., Wang, W.J., Mao, Z48., “Numerical study of solid-liguid two-phase low in sttred vessels with Rushton Impeller, (I) Simulation of flow feld", Chinese J. Chem, Eng., 12 (5), 585609 (2004). 12 Nouri, J.M., Whitelaw, J.H., "Particle velocity characterie. ties of dilate to moderately dense suspension flows in stinred reactors", Int. J. Multiphase Flow, 18, 21—3 (1902) 18 Yamazaki, IL, Tojo, K., Miyanami, K., “Coneeatration pro- Slee of solids suspended in a stirred tank” Adv, Powder ‘Tech, 48, 205216 (1086) 1M Nienow, W.A., “Suspension of slid particles in turbine ag- itated Uatlled vessels", Chem, Eng. Sci 23, 1452-1489 (1968. 15 Rieger, F., Dith, P., Suspension of solid particles”, Chem, Eng. Sei,'49, 2219-2227 (1991), 16 Altway, A., Setyawan, H., Margono, Winardi, S., "Bifect of particle size on the simulation of threedimensional solid dispersion in stirred tank", Trans. IehemE., 79, 1011—1016 (2001). 17 Nagata, S., Mixing: Principles and Applications, Wiley, NewYork (1975). 18 Chudacek, M.W., “Relationship between solide suepen- sion criteria, mechanism of suspension, tank geometry, and scale-up parameters in stirred tank", Ind. Eng Chem. Fundam, 26, 391-401 (1986),