Effect of nozzle arrangement on Venturi scrubber performance

Abstract

The effect of nozzle arrangement on flux distribution is studied in a rectangular, pilot-scale, Pease - Anthony-type Venturi scrubber. The annular, two-phase, heterogeneous, three-dimensional gas - liquid flow inside the scrubber is modeled using a commercial computational fluid dynamic (CFD) package, FLUENT. The comparison of predicted liquid drop concentration shows good agreement with experimental data. The model predicts the fraction of liquid flowing as film on the walls reasonably well. Visualization of flux patterns studied using four typical nozzle configurations indicate that the nonuniformity in flux distribution increases when the nozzle-to-nozzle distance is greater than 10% of the width of the side on which the nozzles are placed. An analysis of the effect of multiple jet penetration lengths on liquid flux distribution yielded a comparable distribution at 10-45% less liquid than uniform penetration for a particular nozzle configuration. This would lead to significant improvements in scrubber performance by achieving comparable collection efficiency at a lower pressure drop.