| follow us: |
|
All Rights Reserved | Copyright @ Mechartés Researchers Private Limited |
of another system, especially a computer program designed for that purpose
CFD Projects
CAE Projects
Customized Software Tools
Gravity Oil-Water Separator Tank
CFD Analysis of Oil-Water Phase Separation Process
Modeling and Analysis
3D CFD model with all the internals were created using CFD modeling tool. Appropriate meshing scheme was used for the tank. The CFD analysis was divided in two stages, in the first stage the analysis of the inlet distributor was done to obtain the mass flow rate coming out from each slot in the inlet distributor. The velocities through the slots were studied to ensure uniform distribution inside the tank. In the second stage, velocity profile obtained in the first stage was used to conduct precise flow simulation of each oil particle inside the tank. This simulation provided characteristics of buoyancy driven flow in the complete tank along with fixed oil skimmer and water outlet boundary condition. The flow due to inlet, outlet and density difference between two fluids in the tank was then simulated to obtain the ppm of oil coming out from the outlets.
Conclusion
Various inlet distributor configurations were analyzed using Computational Fluid Dynamics analysis to verify the uniform mass flow distribution across the sectional area of the tank. Further simulation was conducted to determine the following,
a) Amount of oil going out from the water outlet.
b) Oil-Water phase separation process inside the given gravity separation tank.
The design of distributor slots, number of laterals and lateral length were based on the nature of out flow from the distributor slots. This simulation was carried to achieve a distributor design that will ensure efficient separation of oil from the oil water mixture.
Objective
The main objective of the project was to design the tank internals in an effluent water tank so that the oil concentration in the Effluent water outlet is less than 40 ppm. The internals are designed such that the inlet effluent water and oil mixture gets uniformly distributed across the sectional area of the tank and all the process parameters are achieved in normal operation of the tank. The further objective is that the design shall maximize the hydrodynamic behavior of the flow inside the tank, such that minimum oil is obtained in the effluent water outlet. The inlet distributor is designed to provide uniform distribution of the inlet effluent water and oil mixture across the cross- sectional area of the tank. The flow characteristics of gravity based separation between oil and water are simulated using CFD. From these simulations, oil collected in both fixed oil skimmer and water outlet is quantified and an optimum design for the fixed oil skimmer is suggested.
