Recent Developments in Anode Baking Furnace Design

Abstract

Today, furnace design still proceeds mainly by extrapolation from existing furnaces. Investigating existing furnaces shows the dangers of underestimating the impact of apparently small modifications: e.g., larger pits to accommodate higher anodes can result in furnaces with substandard performance. Side effects such as soot creation have then to be accepted. This paper presents an approach to bake furnace design which completely eliminates extrapolation from existing furnaces. The same approach can be used to estimate the optimization potential for existing furnaces.

Energy Balance Regulation and Flexible Production: A New Frontier for Aluminum Smelting

“…[2] This excellent computational work has confirmed previous experimental studies [4] in terms of the magnitude of heat transfer coefficients from the electrolyte, but unfortunately, the resultant electrolyte conditions (temperature field and superheat) were not determined in these models-rather they were inputs to the simulation. The result is an unrealistic sidewall heat flux and ledge profile because the cell heat balance is not closed.…”

“…The answer can only be that the problem of achieving an acceptable energy balance is extremely difficult, especially in the context of the need to constantly increase production rate and reduce electrical energy consumption. The mind set of constantly increasing production is one which needs to be questioned in the context of international and local market signals, and this has been discussed in a recent market analysis.[1] This analysis concludes that structural oversupply and growing available stocks of aluminum will continue to drive lower prices despite healthy demand for the metal.Recent studies of cell energy balance [2,3] have focused on building superior three dimensional hydrodynamic field models to predict heat transfer coefficients for the electrolyte and metal phases.[2] This excellent computational work has confirmed previous experimental studies [4] in terms of the magnitude of heat transfer coefficients from the electrolyte, but unfortunately, the resultant electrolyte conditions (temperature field and superheat) were not determined in these models-rather they were inputs to the simulation. The result is an unrealistic sidewall heat flux and ledge profile because the cell heat balance is not closed.…”

“…Recent studies of cell energy balance [2,3] have focused on building superior three dimensional hydrodynamic field models to predict heat transfer coefficients for the electrolyte and metal phases.…”

“…Recent studies of cell energy balance [2,3] have focused on building superior three dimensional hydrodynamic field models to predict heat transfer coefficients for the electrolyte and metal phases. [2] This excellent computational work has confirmed previous experimental studies [4] in terms of the magnitude of heat transfer coefficients from the electrolyte, but unfortunately, the resultant electrolyte conditions (temperature field and superheat) were not determined in these models-rather they were inputs to the simulation.…”

Numerical conformal mapping method vs. geometrical separation attitude: Combustion motor chamber internal flow simulation

“…Modeling the flow behavior inside the combustion chamber using different numerical method is an important issue in the physical (aerospace and mechanical engineering) and mathematical (algebra and numerical methods of complex and bluff‐body) [1–28] contexts. Current problem concerns with a steady‐state two‐dimensional reaction between fuel and oxygen that enters from two different parallel locations openings (inlets) through combustion process that was modeled by coupled flow field and mass distribution subjected to the influence of a local discrete vortex.…”