Numerical Analysis of Particle Injection Effect on Gas-Liquid Two-Phase Flow in Horizontal Pipelines

Abstract

In this study, the coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian approach MPPIC-VOF is adopted, which is capable of capturing solid particle motion as well as fluid phase development simultaneously. Prior to three-phase flow simulation, two-phase air-water flow in a specific range of gas and liquid superficial velocities with slug and plug flow patterns is simulated. Then, polypropylene particles are injected as the solid phase into the air-water flow and the effects of particles on pressure drop, void fraction, and flow patterns are studied. The pressure drop and void fraction results are validated for both two-phase and three-phase flows by different correlations and experimental results. As a result of particle injection at the low concentration of 0.5%, void fraction increases by 13.7% and pressure drop changes on average by 18%, respectively. However, there was no significant change in the flow patterns.