Abstract
This study presents a numerical investigation of turbulent gas flow in a packed column with lateral gas injection using the Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) Shear Stress Transport (SST) turbulence model implemented in ANSYS Fluent.The influence of guide plates on the gas-flow characteristics was evaluated by comparing a conventional column configuration with a modified design.The numerical results indicate that the conventional configuration is characterized by non-uniform flow distribution and the presence of recirculation regions, whereas the modified configuration predicts smaller recirculation regions and a more uniform time-averaged velocity field.The incorporation of guide plates results in a moderate increase in pressure drop, from 117 Pa to 140 Pa, while improving the predicted gas-flow distribution under the investigated operating conditions.Comparison with available experimental pressure-drop data showed satisfactory agreement for the investigated conditions.The predicted velocity redistribution and recirculation characteristics should be interpreted as numerical predictions of the steady-state RANS SST model.The proposed numerical approach provides a useful tool for analyzing and optimizing gasflow distribution in packed-column apparatuses.