Packed Beds

Packed beds which are also a special type of “multiphase flow” with fixed interface positions, are widely used apparatuses in chemical engineering, e.g. for adsorption, TCES or reactions. However, due to time constraints simulations are still commonly done only with “black box” models or simplified porous media structures. We focus on the required grid generation work flow for packed beds using DEM methods for creation of random packings of arbitrary shaped particles with any size distribution.

Fully resolved packed beds are simulated to get more detailed information on factors contributing to the total pressure drop of the packing (like gas side maldistribution, bypass streams, near-wall effects), local temperatures, as well as fluid residence time distributions and heterogeneous reactions. Using experimental fluid dynamic approaches the overall parameters in the simulations are compared to experimental results. Also available correlations (e.g. Ergun etc.) are used to make sure about the validity of the newly introduced work flows.