14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

Transport equation for non-uniform suspended sediment

Baozhen Jia1, Deyu Zhong1,2*

1 State Key Laboratory of Hydroscience and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084,
China
2 Joint-Sponsored State Key Laboratory of Plateau Ecology and Agriculture, Qinghai University,
Xining 810016, China
*Corresponding author’s e-mail: zhongdy@tsinghua.edu.cn

Abstract

Interactions between particles in different grain sizes are often underestimated in non-uniform
suspended sediment transport and the involved mechanism remains unclear. This paper aims to
present a new transport equation for non-uniform suspended sediment on basis of two-phase flow
theory, concerning the multi-dispersed sediment mixtures. In combination of the mass and
momentum conservation equations for fluid and each grain class of non-uniform particles, a two
fluid model is developed, with interactions between particles in different grain sizes explicitly
included. Drift velocity, termed as the relative motion of each phase compared to sediment-laden
flows, is introduced for closure of the governing equations. Asymptotic formulation of drift velocity
is obtained in solving the system of momentum equations with the aids of perturbation method. The
new equation is applied for concentration profiles of non-uniform sediment in uniform open channel
flows and the results are compared with experimental data. Well agreement is observed and the new
equation is proved to be applicable to a wide range of grain sizes and sediment concentration.
Comparison with other uniform and non-uniform transport formulas also shows the new equation is
of higher accuracy, which further proves that interactions between particles in different grain sizes
play an important role in sedimentmixture suspension. The new transport equation helps provide
theoretical foundation to elucidate suspension mechanism of non-uniform sediment.

Keywords:Non-uniform;Transport equation;Suspension;Concentration distribution;Open channel flow

1 Introduction
Sediment in natural rivers or artificial channels usually consists of non-uniform particles. As one
of the most important characteristics of sediment mixtures, non-uniform effect plays an important
role in sediment transport and directly affects various fluvial processes. Transport of non-uniform
particles is much more complicated and different compared to that of the uniform ones.On the one
hand, non-uniform particlesmay response differently to the turbulent flows; more importantly, it also
involves interactions between particles in different grain sizes, which adds much more complexity
for sediment transport research.
In recent years, exploratory research has been conducted on non-uniform sediment transport,
either with the aids of flume experiments/field investigations or in a theoretical way based on
different dynamics/statistics theories (Parker, 1991; Wilcock, 2003; Wu et al., 2004). Current
research on non-uniform sediment transport can be roughly divided into two ways. One is to
approximate non-uniform sediment as uniform particles in a representative diameter, usually the
arithmetic mean diameter or the median grain size of the sediment mixtures (Armanini and Di Silvio,
1988; Wu et al., 2004). A non-uniform coefficient is often introduced to account for the impact of
different particles on each other. For example, one of the most widely adopted coefficients is the
hiding/exposing factor, which is often used to distinguish between coarse and fine particles in bed
materials. The other usual way to account for the non-uniform effect is to divide sediment mixture
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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

into discrete groups according to their different grain sizes, and each grain group is analyzed
separately in the same way as uniform sediment (Guo and Jin, 2002; Wu et al., 2004). One of the
representative research is to develop mathematical/analytical models based on the decoupled flow
and sediment transport equations. Zhang and Tan (1992) developed the non-uniform transport
equation based on traditional convection-dispersion equation, considering sediment settling affected
by particles in different grain sizes. Sun et al. (2016) accounted for the non-uniform effect between
different particles with revisions on settling velocity and turbulent diffusivity. Han (2013) developed
non-uniform sediment transport equation while considering the sediment exchange in the boundary
conditions.Exploratory research has also been conducted concerning non-uniform suspended
sediment mixtures based on two-phase flow models (Jha and Bombardelli, 2011).
The aforementioned studies have made significant progress on theoretical research for non-
uniform suspended sediment transport and helped enlighten our analysis. However, according to
Armanini and Di Silvio (1988), Shen and Rao (1991), there is no appropriate grain size capable of
representing all sediment mixtures and applicable for different conditions. While for the
aforementioned grouping method, a common problem is that interactions among different particles
are neither included nor clearly elucidated. The directly application of the uniform methods to the
non-uniform sediment transport may be questionable (Sun et al., 2016).Despite of the ubiquitous
non-uniformity in sediment transport, to the best of our knowledge, few research has been conducted
to account for the interactions between particles in different grain sizes and analyzing the impact on
sediment suspension. The non-uniformity effect on sediment transport has not been fully elucidated,
and transport mechanism of non-uniform particles remains unclear.
Therefore, this paper aims to present a new transport equation for non-uniform suspended
sediment and help provide theoretical foundation for further revelation of suspension mechanism of
non-uniform sediment.

2Theoretical background

2.1 Basic governing equations

Governingequations for flow and sediment in each grain class are derived based on the Eulerian-
Eulerian two-phase flow theory. In a consistent way of Gera et al. (2004), first, typical uniform
equations based on two-phase flow theory (Hsu et al., 2003; Zhong et al., 2014) are further extended
to develop the governing equation for non-uniform suspended sediment.Non-uniform sediment
mixture is composed of N classes of distinct particulate phases in different grain sizes,and the
corresponding equation is developed with the interactions between particles in different grain sizes
explicitly included.
Since we are more concerned with the macroscopic-average state of flow and particles rather than
the instantaneous condition, ensemble average is first applied to obtain the averages of different
variables. In addition, to account for the large-scale turbulence effect and in avoidance of the
complex calculations of the concentration related items, a second Favre average is also applied.
Basic mass and momentum equations for flow and sediment are proposed as
For fluid phase

(1)

(2)

For non-uniform particulate phase

(3)

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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

(4)

Where the subscript f denotes the fluid phase and s (s=1,2,…N) denotes the particulate phaseinsthsize
class; = volume fraction of fluid; = volume fraction of sthparticulate phase, leading to +
∑ = 1; =density; = velocity;p =pressure; = stress tensor; = the interaction between
flow and sedimenteach grain class.For the flow phase, it is a combination of the interaction between
flow and each particulate phase,in the form of ∑ ; is the interaction between particles in s
grain class and lgrain class. The superscript “-” represents the ensemble average while the
superscripttilde “~” represents the volume average.
Drag force is considered as the main external interaction between flow and sediment, since
researchers have compared the relative importance of different interphase forces and indicated that
drag force is the primary one (Jha and Bombardelli, 2011; Zhong et al., 2014). After a secondaverage,
drag force corresponding to each particulate phase is depicted as follows:

(5)

Where = relaxation time of particle in sth grain class and determined in the formulation of =
⁄ 1− ⁄ (Rogers and Eaton, 1990); = turbulent diffusivity. The second term of the
right hand side is turbulence diffusive item produced in the average process.
Research shows that particle-particle drag force plays a dominant role in the interaction between
particles in different grain sizes and always acts as its approximation (Arastoopour et al., 1982; Gera
et al., 2004). Therefore, Fsliis defined as the particle-particle drag forcebetween particles in s and l
grain class, and theformula in Arastoopouret al. (1982) is adopted for its determination.With a
second average, the interaction between particles in different grain sizes is approximated as the
particle-particle drag force in the form of

(6)

Where the coefficient can be considered as the timescale of interactions between particles in
⁄ 0.7 . | − | , the subscript l1
different grain sizes, depictedin the form of =
represents the relative large particle, while s1 represents the small one, concerning the interaction
between particles in two different grain sizes.

2.2 Constitutive relation of drift velocity

For closure of the two-phase flow equations, a term of drift velocity is often introduced, which is
described as a function of the relative velocity either betweensediment and carrier flows or between
sediment and two-phase mixture.Constitutive relation of drift velocity is widely applied for the
uniform sediment, it is necessary to extend it to the cases of non-uniform ones.Drift velocity for non-
uniform sediment is defined as the relative velocity between each phase and that of the two-phase
mixture, indicating that

(7)

Where = +∑ is the volume averaged velocity of the two-phase mixture; is the

th
drift velocity of k phase; with the subscript k representing each phase.

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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

For convenience of analysis, the dimensionless form of the equation is preferred. With the
introduction of different characteristic scales, different variables in the momentum equation are non-
dimensionalized,and the momentum equation of each particulate phase becomes

(8)

WhereF = ⁄ = Froude number; Re = ⁄Γ= Reynold number; the superscript ‘0’ represents the
non-dimensional symbol.
The determination of drift velocity is of essential importance to solve the two-phase mixture
equations. With the introduction of drift velocity, after a series of mathematical manipulation, Eq.(4)
can be transformed as

(9)

Where is a combination of the dynamic factors related to the transport of particulate phase, which
is depicted in the form of

(10)

Where = ̅ ⁄ =Stokes number. It is a particle inertia coefficientdefined as ratio of granular

relaxation time to the time-scale of turbulence flow ⁄ .In a similar way, a new coefficient
= ̅ ⁄ is introduced, which is a dimensionless parameter related to the interactions among
particles in different grain sizes.Withhydrostatic pressure assumption applied, ̅ ⁄ = − can
be obtained. In open-channel flows, with water depth as the characteristic length scale and friction
velocity as the characteristic velocity scale, Re = ⁄Γis further obtained.
Rather than the numerical discretization, we aim to work on the analytical solution of Eq.(9) to
obtain the constitutive relation of drift velocity. First, the Sherman-Morrison formula method is
adopted to solve the matrix equations. Second, since Stokes number is usually small (Zhong et al.,
2014), it is adopted as a perturbation parameter.According to Druzhinin (1995), drift velocity can be
depicted as apower function of Stokes number. Required accuracyof Eq. (9) can be achieved when
the zero-order and first order are considered, ignoring the terms of higher orders.Therefore, the
constitutive equation of drift velocity in each grain size is developed as

(11)

Where Ω is determined by 1⁄Ω = + ∑ , and is the element of matrix B which

is acoefficient matrix in solving Eq.(9).

2.3 Transport equation

Based on the constitutive equation of drift velocity for each granular phase, transport equation is
further developed.

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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

(12)

Integration of Eq.(12) over the control volume in vertical direction, and coupled with the boundary
condition for equilibrium sediment transport | = 0and ≠ 0, Eq.(12)is transformed as

(13)

Eq.(13) clearly shows the drift velocity of particles in sth grain class is closely related to that of other
grain sizes. In combination withthe constitutive relation of drift velocity, vertical concentration
distributionofsediment in each grain class can be obtained afterseries of mathematical manipulation,
which is depicted in the following form

(14)

Where can be regarded as the diffusion coefficient of particles in sth grain size,in the form of
= + − ; is a mathematical coefficient in solving the equation set.
Eq. (14) can be considered as the simplified transport equation for particles in sthgrain class in
uniform open channel flows. It can be observed that the suspension of non-uniform particles is the
overall interactionbetween flow and particles and also particles in different grain sizes.
Theoretically, it is more appropriate to apply the two-phase turbulent models for closure of the
equations. However, uncertainty remains for the application of two-phase turbulent models, and the
computation can be fairly complex. Since the adoption of empirical formulas can achieve acceptable
accuracy (Greimann and Holly, 2001; Zhong et al., 2014), empirical formulas are chosen for
turbulence closure. Stress tensor of the particulate phase in the vertical direction can be described
with the formulainEnwald (1996)

(15)

Where g0= the radial distribution function, defined in the following form (Gidaspow, 1994). kp=
turbulent kinetic energy of particles, which can be determined with the formula
= where =3 ⁄2 is the turbulent kinetic energy of clear water;Dp= turbulent
modulation coefficient, which is validated with experimental data due to the lack of theoretical
formulation, response function Cp is determined with the formula proposed by Oliveira and
Issa(2003).
According to Greimann and Holly (2001), turbulent diffusivity can be determined as

(16)

Where accounts for the particle cross-trajectory effect, which is defined in the formula of
Csanady(1963), = Karman coefficient of sediment laden flow. In addition, to determine the
settling velocity of single particle, the formula in Julien (1995) is adopted;and it is further revised via
multiplied by a coefficient to account for the population effect (Richardson and Zaki, 1954).

3 Verification and application

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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

To evaluate the performance of the new equation, in this section, we apply the transport equation
to investigate the concentration profiles of particles in different grain sizes.Experimental data in
Taggart et al. (1972)are adopted for comparison. Basic flow and sediment characteristics of the
chosen runs are list in Table 1.
Inaddition, to comparewith the uniform equations, concentration profiles of each grain class is also
calculated with the uniform formulas in Rouse (1937)and Zhong et al.(2014).Moreover, the new
equation is also compared with other non-uniform transport formulasto highlight its features.Typical
non-uniform transport equations in Zhang and Tan (1992), Sun et al. (2016) are adopted. Comparison
results of different formulations with the experiment are shown in Fig.1.
(1)Formula in Zhong et al. (2014)

(17)

Where = 1− ⁄ 1−
(2)Formula in Zhang and Tan (1992)

(18)

Where = a modification coefficient to account for non-uniform effect, which is determined based
on the formula inBatchelor (1982).
(3)Formula in Sun et al. (2016)

(19)

Where = the geometric variance of grain sizes as =( . ⁄ + ⁄ . )⁄2 , is an

empirical coefficient, ks= bed roughness expressed as a function of median grain size ks=3Dm.

Table 1. Flow and sediment properties in the representative experiments of Taggart et al.(1972)
Grain size Reference
Name Run depth(m) u*(m/s) km slope
（mm） concentration
0.106 0.00754
0.210 0.00538
44 0.075 0.06 0.4 0.008 0.314 0.00738
0.424 0.00811
Taggart 0.528 0.00375
et al.
(1972) 0.106 0.00819
0.210 0.00671
47 0.075 0.07 0.4 0.008 0.314 0.01332
0.424 0.01711
0.528 0.01191

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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

(a) T44

(b) T47
Figure 1. Comparison of vertical concentration profiles with different formulas with selected data of
Taggart et al. (1972)

The result shows thatwell agreement can be achieved between the calculationswith the new
equation and the observations in Taggart et al. (1972), which helps prove the validity of the new
equation for simulating non-uniform sediment suspension. In comparison with other methods, in the
runsof low concentration and small grain size, the simulation results with different formulas are
relatively close, while with the concentration and grain size increase, our new formula provides
better performance compared to other equations.Especiallywhen compared to the uniform formulas,
the evident improvement of the non-uniform formula explicitly shows that non-uniform effect plays
an important role in the non-uniform sediment suspension.
In fact,for the new transport equation Eq. (14), the right hand side (RHS) are basic items
contributing to concentration distribution.The RHS can be concluded as the self settlingand inertia
items of particles in sth grain class, and the last two items to account for the non-uniform effect, i.e.,
the settling and inertia items of particles in other grain sizes. In the special condition where the
interaction between particles in different grain sizes can be ignored, the last two terms become zero,
and the diffusion coefficient becomes = 1⁄ − . Then the transport equation can
be changed exactly the same with Eq. (17) in Zhong et al. (2014). It indicates that the new non-
uniform transport equation can become automatically adapted to the uniform one under certain
circumstances and the uniform transport equation acts as a special form ofthe new equation.Non-
uniform effect is proved to play an important role in sediment mixture suspension, the corresponding
contribution and its variation will be more clarified in the following papers.

Conclusions
In this paper, transport equation for non-uniform suspended sediment is proposed, which to our
best of knowledge, is one of the very few research on non-uniform sediment suspension based on
two-phase flow theory.The equation prevails in the following aspects:
Non-uniform effect is rigorously accounted for in the transport equation, since interaction between
fluid and particles and particles in different grain sizes are explicitly included as source terms in the
momentum equation. The interactions between particles in different grain sizes act as a function of
the relative velocity of each particulate phase, which automatically depicts the velocity difference
and momentum transfer between each phases. Rather than the numerical discretization in other
research, the constitutive relation of drift velocity is specifically derived, acts as the theoretical
foundation of the new transport equation. The new equation clearly shows the suspension of non-
uniform sediment can be attributed to influences imposed by interactions between flow and different
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14th International Symposium on River Sedimentation, September 16-19, 2019, Chengdu, China

particles, as well as the particles in different grains sizes, which theoretically reveals the non-uniform
effect on particle suspension.
The calculated concentration profilesare compared to the experimental data, and satisfactory
consistency between calculation and observation proves that the transport equation is available for
the concentration distributions of non-uniform sediment with a wide range of grain sizes.
Comparison with other non-uniform formulas also indicates higher accuracy of the equation. In the
conditionwith low concentration and small grain size, the discrepancy between the uniform and non-
uniform methods is not obvious, while in the high concentration conditions with the large disparity
of grain sizes, the difference between the uniform and non-uniform methods becomes remarkable,
indicating the importance of non-uniform effect on sediment suspension.

Acknowledgement
The authors gratefully appreciate the support of the National Natural Science Foundation of China
(Grant No.91547204), and National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No.
2017YFC0404303).

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