Analysis of the effect of mixing vane geometry on the flow in an annular centrifugal contactor |
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| Authors: | Kent E. Wardle Todd R. Allen Mark H. Anderson Ross E. Swaney |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Dept. of Engineering Physics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706;2. Dept. of Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706 |
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| Abstract: | The annular centrifugal contactor is a compact mixer/centrifuge developed for solvent extraction processes for recycling used nuclear fuel. This research effort couples computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling with a variety of experimental observations to provide a valid detailed analysis of the flow within the centrifugal contactor. CFD modeling of the free surface flow in the annular mixing zone using the volume-of-fluid method combined with large eddy simulation of turbulence was found to have very good agreement with the experimental measurements. A detailed comparative analysis of the flow and mixing with different housing vane geometries (four straight vanes, eight straight vanes, and curved vanes) was performed. Two additional variations on the eight straight vane geometry were also simulated. This analysis determined that at the simulated moderate flow rate the four straight mixing vane geometry has greater mixing and fluid residence time as compared to the other mixing vane configurations. © 2009 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2009 |
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| Keywords: | liquid–liquid extraction reprocessing turbulent mixing computational fluid dynamics volume-of-fluid |
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