Pressure drop simulation of structured corrugation foam packing by computational fluid dynamics

Abstract

Pressure drop is proved to be an important parameter influencing the capacity of both structured packing towers and catalytic reactors. A computational fluid dynamic method is proposed to predict the pressure losses within the newly developed foam SiC ceramic structured packing. The present work simulates the flow pattern in a macrostructure model and the typical REU mechanisms, and further studies the effect of corrugation angle on pressure drop. A comparison between simulation results and experimental data of our previous work is given to validate the models. A large corrugation angle, such as 60◦, could minimize the pressure losses.