Energy Sources, Part A: Recovery, Utilization, and

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Different methods of numerical simulation of non-

premixed combustion in the packed bed

Chizhao Chen , Meijie Zhang , Huazhi Gu , Haifeng Li , Yuntao Qu , Chang Yu

& Tingshou Li

To cite this article: Chizhao Chen , Meijie Zhang , Huazhi Gu , Haifeng Li , Yuntao Qu , Chang
Yu & Tingshou Li (2020): Different methods of numerical simulation of non-premixed combustion
in the packed bed, Energy Sources, Part A: Recovery, Utilization, and Environmental Effects, DOI:
10.1080/15567036.2020.1813220

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/15567036.2020.1813220

Published online: 23 Sep 2020.

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ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS
https://doi.org/10.1080/15567036.2020.1813220

Different methods of numerical simulation of non-premixed

combustion in the packed bed
Chizhao Chena, Meijie Zhang a,b
, Huazhi Gu, Haifeng Li c
, Yuntao Qua, Chang Yub,
and Tingshou Lib
a
The State Key Laboratory of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China;
b
Zhejiang Red Eagle Group Co. Ltd, Huzhou City, Zhejiang Province, China; cEngineering Research Center of Nano-
Geomaterials of Ministry of Education, Faculty of Materials Science and Chemistry, China University of Geosciences,
Wuhan, China

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

It is difficult to choose the appropriate numerical simulation methods to Received 12 May 2019
model the character of non-premixed diffusion combustion in particle Revised 12 August 2020
packed bed among so many various methods. Four different numerical Accepted 15 August 2020
methods were used to simplify the gas flow through the packed beds, the KEYWORDS
non-premixed diffusion combustion of methane in a plane-parallel packed Non-premixed combustion;
bed was simulated considering the chemical equilibrium and thermal radia­ packed bed; numerical
tion. The gas flow field, temperature and flame characteristics were analyzed simulation; CFD-DEM; porous
using computational fluid dynamics coupled with discrete element method media
(CFD-DEM) which calculates the fluid-particle interaction force considering
the drag force and the pressure gradient force, the gas flow velocity magni­
tudes in the particle packed bed simulated by CFD-DEM are smaller than
those by porous media and Ergun equation. The maximum velocity of gas
varies from 0.22 m/s to 0.80 m/s using four different methods. Compared the
flame shape and height with experimental test values, the flame heights
simulated by M2 and M3 are both 10% smaller than that of the experimental
result, which is reasonable because of carbon black. The maximum combus­
tion temperature simulated by M4 is more 400 K higher than those by M2 and
M3. This study shows that only using CFD-DEM, the flame height of non-
premixed diffusion combustion in a packed bed can be reasonably simu­
lated. For industrial engineering packed bed, CFD-DEM is the priority choice
to calculate the fluid-particle interact force.

Introduction
Non-premixed combustion of gas in packed bed is a basic combustion style that combines the
characteristics of diffusion combustion and filtration combustion. It has been widely applied in
metallurgy, chemical industry and energy field. Consequently, characteristics of diffusion filtration
combustion have been received significant attention over the past two decades, such as Kamiuto and
Miyamoto (2004) experimentally and analytically examined the flame shape and flame height in
a plane-parallel packed bed. Biyikoglu and Sivrioglu (2004) studied the combustion of coal-fired
boiler with a fixed bed by two-dimensional (2D) model. However, their predicted flame widths were in
general smaller than those of experimental results because of neglecting thermal radiation and particle
resistance.
After then, some experimental studies (Muhad et al. 2011) and numerical simulations (Bastian et al.
2015 & Boyang et al. 2019) simplified the diffusion filtered combustion in packed bed as combustion in

CONTACT Meijie Zhang zhangmeijie@wust.edu.cn The State Key Laboratory of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan
University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei 430081, P.R. China; Haifeng Li lihf@cug.edu.cn No.68 Jincheng Street, East Lake
High-Tech Development Zone, Wuhan, Hubei 430078, PR China
© 2020 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
2 C. CHEN ET AL.

porous media. They described the mathematical model by adding a source term in the momentum
equation, which can be calculated by Ergun equation (Bastian et al. 2015 & Ergun and Orning 1949),
pressure-drop test (Junrui et al. 2012), or coupled with CFD-DEM (Tong et al. 2013). Only the
superficial velocity and temperature of the fluid can be acquired from above methods. The advantage
of them is a considerable saving of computational resources (Krause et al. 2015).
Some other numerical studies (Copertaro et al. 2015 & Krause et al. 2017) treated the dispersion
process as a particle-fluid flow: the discrete particle flow was modeled by DEM or DPM, and the
continuous fluid flow was modeled by CFD. The interaction force (ffp,i) between particles and fluid
can be quantified by the sum of several forces including viscous drag force, pressure gradient force,
virtual mass force and lift force. There were mainly two methods to calculate ffp,i in the past
researches. Some researchers calculated ffp,i coupled CFD with DEM (Bluhm et al. 2010 & Krause
et al. 2017). Chu et al. (2011) studied multi-phase flow in dense medium cyclones considering the
viscous drag force and pressure gradient force. Tong et al. (2013) investigated the dispersion
mechanisms in commercial dry powder inhalers considering the viscous drag force, pressure
gradient force and the van der Waals force. Another researchers calculated ffp,i by a modified
Ergun equation which simplified the packed bed as a porous medium, such as (Krause et al.
2015) and Drenhaus (Copertaro et al. 2015). The effect of particle size, density and shapes on the
fluid flow and temperature distribution can be acquired as well as consume large computational
resources by this method. Krause et al. (2017) spent more than 3 weeks of computational time (on
mainstream hardware-two Xeon CPU with 12 cores @ 2.3 GHz, 32GB DDR3) to study the
intermittent operating lime shaft kiln using this method. It has become the main challenge to
simulate the flow and combustion for industrial particle packed bed project.
As reviewed above, different numerical methods have great differences in the simulation results of
the gas flow field, flame shapes and heights, and temperature distribution in the packed bed. However,
no reference compared the simulated results by different methods, and it is confused to select the
appropriate method in specific condition. Large amount of computing resources was consumed in
simulating the combustion in industrial packed bed.
This study aims to simulate the experimental cases (Kamiuto and Miyamoto 2004) using a three-
dimensional (3D) two-phase model with non-premixed combustion. We treat the packed bed as the
porous medium and particle-fluid flow, respectively. For each method, we calculated the particle-fluid
interaction forces by Ergun equation and CFD-DEM based on the interaction force (Fpf) calculation,
respectively. Then, we compared the results of flame shape, flame height, temperature distribution for
combustion in the parallel packed bed simulated by four different methods and experimental test.
Proposals are given on how to select the suitable modeling method for non-premixed combustion in
a packed bed based on our analysis of results.

Numerical simulation
Physical model
A methane-oxygen diffusion combustor in a plane-parallel packed bed reported by Kamiuto and
Miyamoto (2004) is selected as physical model in this paper because it is a typical non-premixed
diffusion combustion case in the packed bed. On the other hand, the results of experiment, theory
calculation and numerical simulation by porous medium (Junrui et al. 2012) of this model were
published. They provided comparison and verification of our studies. Figure 1 shows the schematic of
the simulation zone which includes three parts: fuel and oxygen inlet zone (40 mm height), packed bed
zone (35 mm wide, 85 mm long and 130 mm height) and flue gas zone (35 mm wide, 85 mm long and
170 mm height). The gas burner is composed of three flat zone type stainless steel ducts: two 10 mm
width air flow ducts on the sides, and one 10 mm width fuel flow duct in the middle. The length and
height of the burner are 85 mm and 40 mm, respectively. The methane-nitrogen mixture and the oxygen
entered through the central zone and ducts on the sides, respectively. The packed bed is composed of
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 3

Figure 1. The schematic of the simulation zone.

alumina pellets with the diameter of 3.18 mm. The combustion chamber is thermally insulated
surrounding the walls.
The following assumptions are made to simplify the model:
(1) Solid particles were simplified as standard spheres, volume changes and particle breakage were
not taken into account during the accumulation of solid particles.
(2) The thermal conductivity and heat capacity of solid particles did not change during the heating
process.
(3) Methane, oxygen and combustion products were regarded as ideal gases and gas radiation is
computed by P1 model (Sazhin et al. 1996) because it is particularly useful for accounting for the
radiation exchange between gas and particles.
(4) Heat loss through the burner walls to the surrounding was ignored.
4 C. CHEN ET AL.

Mathematical model
The instantaneous thermochemical state of the fluid is related to a conserved scalar quantity known as
the mixture fraction. Fuel and oxidizer enter the reaction zone in distinct streams, so the non-
premixed combustion model was selected. Based on the above assumptions, a set of differential
equations can be obtained:
(1) Continuity equation

@ðϕρg Þ
þ 5 � ðϕρg uÞ ¼ 0 (1)
@t
(2) Momentum equation

@ðϕρg uÞ
þ ðu5Þ � ðϕρg uÞ ¼ ϕρg g 5p þ μeff 5 2 u Ffp (2)
@t
Ffp is the volumetric fluid-particle interaction force, and its calculation methods are described in detail
in section 2.3.
where μeff ¼ μ0 þ μt and μt = Cµρκ2/ε.
κ and ε are calculated by the stand κ – ε turbulence model (Silva, Franca, and VielmoH. 2007) and
the equations are not listed here to save space.
(3) Species and energy conservation equations
For the packed bed, the i-th species conservation equation is as follow:

@ðϕρg Yi Þ
þ 5ðϕρg Yi uÞ ¼ ϕρg g 5p þ 5ðDeff 5 Yi Þ þ ϕRi Mi (3)
@t
The energy equations for both gas and particles are given as follow:
For gas:

@ðϕρg Cg Tg Þ � �
þ 5 ðϕρg Cg Tg þ pÞu ¼ Ñðkeff 5 Tg Þ þ QR þ Qfp (4)
@t
For particles:
� �
@ ð1 ϕÞρp Cp Tp
¼ 5ðkp 5 Tp Þ Qfp (5)
@t
Qfp is the heat transfer flow between gas and particles which includes the heat transfer flow by
radiation Qrad and by convective Qconv:

Qfp ¼ Qrad þ Qconv (6)

where Qrad is calculated by P1 radiation model, the detail description can be seen in many published
reports, such as (Houping et al. 2019).
Qconv is calculated coupled with fluid-solid model.
QR is the combustion reaction heat which can be calculated from methane combustion equation.
(4) Methane combustion equation
Methane is used as fuel to provide the heat. Methane is injected through fuel lances into the burner
(see Figure 1). The gas combustion is described on the CFD side with the standard “one-step methane/
air combustion” model. It uses an Arrhenius rate expression for the definition of the conversion rates
(Equation (7) to Equation (9)).

CH4 ðgÞ þ 2O2 ðgÞ ¼ CO2 ðgÞ þ 2H2 OðgÞ ΔH020� C ¼ 802:3kJ=molCH4 (7)
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 5

� �
ER 0:1
RCH4 ¼ AR � exp � YCH � YO1:65 (8)
RTg 4 2

X
n
QR ¼ ϕhi Ri Mi (9)
i¼1

Here the pre-exponential factors are AR = 6.186 × 109 and the activation energies are ER = 125.6 kJ/mol
(Acampora, Marra, and Martelli 2016).

Calculation of fluid–particle interaction force Fpf

Coupled CFD with DEM
DEM was used to simulate the particle movement and stacking process in the packed bed, then
coupling CFD to calculate the gas flow in the particle bed. Thus, the particle motion can be described
independently. Each particle’s translational and rotational movements are described by Newton’s and
Euler’s laws of motion which can be found in many related publications (Bluhm et al. 2010 & Krause
et al. 2017).
The volumetric fluid-particle interaction force Ffp is the sum of all fluid-particle interaction forces
per unit volume (9),
1 XNp
Ffp ¼ f
i¼1 fp;i
(10)
Vcell
ffp,i considered in this study includes the viscous drag force (fD,i) and pressure gradient force (fP,i)
(Shilei et al. 2017).
fpf;i ¼ fD;i þ fP;i (11)

� � � �
4:8 2 ρg �ug up �ðug up Þ πd2 β
fD;i ¼ 0:63 þ pffiffiffiffiffi ϕ (12)
Re 2 4

fP;i ¼ up;i Ñp (13)

where β is the empirical coefficient, which can be calculated according to (13),
" #
ð1:5 log ReÞ2
β ¼ 3:7 0:65 exp (14)
2

Porous media model

The packed bed was simplified as a porous medium and the presser loss in the gas flow direction
through the packed bed was calculated by Ergun formula (Ergun and Orning 1949 & Houping et al.
2019) expressed as Equation (14),
2
Δp ð1 ϕÞ2 μug 1 ϕ ρg ug
¼ 150 3 2
þ 1:75 3 (15)
Δl ϕ d ϕ d
In the coupled CFD-DEM scheme, the particles distribution was solved using DEM, Firstly. Then,
Ansys Fluent was used to solve the governing equations of gas flow through the particles. The fluid-
particle interaction force was calculated by Equation (11). The fluid field and pressure distribution
were obtained.
The calculation methods in this paper were summarized in Table 1.
6 C. CHEN ET AL.

Table 1. Four calculation methods of Ffp.

Methods Packed bed treatment Ffp solution method
M1 Porous Ergun equation and experience formula
M2 Porous Ergun equation and drag force model
M3 DEM Drag force model
M4 DEM Ergun equation and experience formula

Table 2. The physical properties of alumina pellets.

Physical Property Unit Value
Density kg/m3 3773
Thermal conductivity W � m 1K 1 5
Diameter mm 3.18
Heat capacity J � kg 1 K 1 780
Porosity [Dimensionless] 0.39/0.37
Filling height mm 130
Emissivity - 0.93

Simulation conditions
The alumina pellets were assumed as perfect sphere balls and the physical properties were shown in
Table 2.
The following boundary conditions are considered in this simulation.
(1) Gas and solid temperatures, velocities and species mass fraction at the inlet (z = −40 mm):

Tg ¼ Tp ¼ 300K; up ¼ 0; ug ¼ 0:088m=s; YCH4 ¼ YCH4 ;in ; YO2 ¼ YO2 ;in ; YN2 ¼ YN2 ;in (16)

@Tg @Tg @YCH4 @YCH4 @YO2 @YO2

þ ¼ þ ¼ þ ¼0 (17)
@x @y @x @y @x @y

� �
@Tp @Tp 4
λeff þ ¼ εr ðTp;out T04 Þ (18)
@x @y

where εr is the emissivity of particle surface, in this model, εr = 0.85.

(2) Gas and solid temperatures, velocities and species mass fraction at the outlet (z = 300 mm):

@Tg @Tp @Yi @u

¼ ¼ ¼ ¼0 (19)
@z @z @z @z

Numerical solution schemes for coupled CFD-DEM

The transfer grid is necessary because of the size range of the particles in relation to the resolution of both
the DEM and the CFD grids. The CFD cells are of the same order of magnitude as the particles’ average
diameter. The transfer grid has a substantially smaller spatial resolution than the DEM grid and is much
more smaller than the CFD mesh, to capture the effect of particles overlapping different fluid cells. So, the
gas flow zone and the pellets were meshed with different types, respectively. The grid for the DEM
simulation is an orthogonal, Cartesian type with mesh size prescribed by the particle diameter. While the
CFD mesh is unstructured hexahedral mesh with mesh size 1.5 times larger than of the particle diameter
(Jidong and Tong 2013). After mesh independence verification for CFD, the CFD mesh size was 3.3 times
of the grid of DEM. The total number of CFD zone is 16600 cells, while 13600 grids in the DEM zone.
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 7

In order to take advantage of this CFD development, we have extended our CFD-DEM code with
software Ansys 14.5 (Fluent Module) as a platform, achieved by incorporating a DEM code into Fluent
through its User Defined Functions (UDF).
The time step size in DEM was 6 × 10−5 s, which was less than 30% of the Rayleigh time step size. To
ensure the stability of calculation, the time step size in fluent was set as 50 times as that in DEM.
At first time step, the Newton’s and Euler’s laws of motion equations (Bluhm et al. 2010 & Krause
et al. 2017) were calculated by DEM, the position and velocity of each individual particle were given.
The positions of all particles were then matched with the fluid cells to calculate relevant informations
of each cell such as porosity by coupled with CFD using our CFD-DEM code. Then the continuity
equation, momentum equation, energy equation, and component transport equations were solved to
obtain the velocity, pressure, temperature and component of each cell by Ansys 14.5 (Fluent Module).
They were used to calculate the fluid-particle interaction force Ffp according to Equations (9)–(11).
When a converged solution is obtained, the information of Ffp will be passed to the DEM for the next
time step calculation.
The SIMPLE algorithm was used to handle the pressure and velocity coupling. The residuals of 10−6
for energy equations and radiation equation, and 10−3 for all other equations were taken as the
convergence criteria.

Results and discussion

Gas flow field
The main differences of four simulation methods are fluid-particle interaction forces which directly
affect the gas flow field. Figure 2 shows the velocity magnitudes and flow streamlines in the vertical
central plane simulated by four different methods as Table 1. The sudden contraction flows to the
center at the out let of the packed bed are more obvious simulated by M3 and M4. The maximum
velocities are different which increase from 0.22 m/s to 0.8 m/s calculated by M1 and M4. Figure 3
shows the velocity magnitudes in the vertical central plane in the packed bed zone. Only using M3, the
microscopic flow field in the pores formed by particle packing can be observed as shown in Figure 3(c).
The velocities obtained using M1, M2 and M4 are the superficial velocities of gas flow through the
packed bed. So, only using CFD-DEM, the gas flow characteristics in the particle-packed pores can be
simulated.
Though the maximum value of gas velocity magnitude simulated by M4 is the largest (Figure 2),
however, in the packed bed zone, the values simulated by M3 are larger than those by M4, and the
values simulated by M2 are larger than those by M1 (Figure 3). Figure 4 shows the average gas

Figure 2. The contour of gas velocity magnitudes and streamlines calculated by (a) M1 (b) M2 (c) M3 and (d) M4.
8 C. CHEN ET AL.

Figure 3. The contour of gas velocity magnitudes in the vertical central plane of packed bed zone by (a) M1 (b) M2 (c) M3 and (d) M4.

Figure 4. The gas average velocities along the vertical direction in packed bed zone modeled by four methods.

velocities along the vertical direction calculated by four different methods. It can be seen, by the
same method to treat packed bed, such as M1 and M2 treated it as the porous media, M3 and M4
accumulated by DEM, the average gas velocity in the packed bed zone simulated by M1 is smaller
than that by M2 (Uav,M1< Uav,M2), as well as Uav,M3< Uav,M4. This is because the fluid-particle
interaction force Ffp calculated by Ergun is larger than that by DEM-CFD. On the other hand, for
the same value of Ffp (M2 and M3), the average gas velocities in the packed bed zone simulated
using porous media model are smaller than those by DEM-CFD coupled (Uav,M2< Uav,M3). Because
at the same gas flow rate, the total pores volume calculated by DEM is smaller than that by porous
media.

Flame shape and height

The flame shape and height are determined by the flame front. Kamimuto and Ogawa (1997)
characterized the flame front according to the color of visible light of the flame. Junrui et al. (2012)
selected the flame front where the mass fraction of methane was 29% of that in the inlet. While in his
another reference (Junrui et al. 2015), the flame front was set at the position where OH mass fraction
was 0.00033 ~ 0.00722. Turns (1996) considered that the ratio of fuel to oxidant equals the stoichio­
metric ratio at the flame front. In this physical model, the stoichiometric ratio at the inlet is about
0.304. Figure 6 shows the contour lines of mass fraction of O2 equals 0.48 (YO2 =0.48) and CH4 equals
0.04 (YCH4 =0.04) respectively. It can be found that the two lines are almost coincident, and the
stoichiometric ratio at these two lines is about 0.333, which is close to that of the inlet. So, we selected
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 9

Figure 5. Flame shapes and flame heights obtained by four different calculation methods, experimental and theoretical calculation
values of Kamiuto(a) M1, (b) M2, (c) M3, (d) M4.

Figure 6. Comparison of flame height, (a) absolute height obtained by different methods (b) relative error between the calculated
value and experimental value.

the zone between count lines of YO2 =0.48 and YCH4 =0.04 as the flame front. Figure 5 shows the flame
shape simulated by four different methods as well as flame shapes of experiment and theoretical
calculation.
It can be seen from Figure 5 that the prediction of the shape and bottom width of the flame are
consistent with Kamiuto’s experimental and theoretical calculation results. However, there are big
differences in the predictions of flame height as shown in Figure 6. The flame heights simulated by M2
and M3 were lower than the experimental values, while the calculated values simulated by M1 and M4
were higher than the experimental values. It is well known that the flame height depends on the fuel
flow velocity, fuel and oxygen diffusion rate as well as combustion reaction rate. For methods of M1
and M2, after fuel and oxygen inter into the porous media, they are considered as mixed diffusion
combustion (Kamimuto and Ogawa 1997), the higher gas velocity makes the smaller length flame
(Zhongya et al. 2018 & Soloklou and Golneshan 2020). So, the flame height simulated by M2 is smaller
than that by M1 (HM2< HM1), and that by M3 is smaller than that by M4 (HM3< HM4), because Uav,M1
< Uav,M2, Uav,M4< Uav, M3. Although the gas velocity calculated by M3 is much higher than by M2, the
calculated flame heights are almost the same. Because method M3 treated the gas flow zone as many
micro-pores separated by the particles, the fuel and oxygen do not mix as quickly as they flow into the
packed bed because of the slower lateral diffusion rate of fuel and oxygen.
Sunderland et al. (1999) showed that the luminous height usually exceeded 10%~60% of the height
of stoichiometric ratio because of carbon black in the flame which would block the flame shape. So, the
10 C. CHEN ET AL.

simulated flame height should be 10 ~ 60% lower than the experimental values. The relative error of
flame height was calculated as formula (20) and shown as Figure 6(b).
Hi Hexp
γ¼ � 100% (20)
Hexp
where Hi is the flame height calculated by four different methods as shown in Table 1.
Hexp is the flame height measured by Kamiuto’s experiment.
It can be seen from Figure 6(b) that the relative error of flame height calculated by M2 and M3 are
both 10% smaller than that of the experimentally measured. So, M2 and M3 can be used to reasonably
predict the flame height of gas combustion in packed bed. Houping et al. (2019) and Junrui et al. (2012)
used the same physical model to study the Non-premixed combustion in a packed bed by the porous
medium model which fluid-particle interaction was calculated by Ergun equation and experience
formula. The result of their calculation is shown in Figure 6 (Ref.). Although their result was closer to
the experimental value shown in Figure 6 (EXP.), the flame height was still higher than the experimental
value. So, when calculating the non-premixed combustion in packed bed by porous medium, the fluid-
particle interaction force should not be calculated by Ergun equation and experience formula.

Combustion temperature
Figure 7 shows the temperature distributions of gas (Tg) and particles (Tp) simulated by four different
methods. Two symmetrical high-temperature zones are observed immediately above the fuel inlet
simulated by four different methods which are similar to those in open diffusion flame (Shilei et al.
2017). However, the maximum temperature and the height of high-temperature zone are different.
The maximum temperature simulated by M4 is about 400 K higher than that by other methods and the
two high-temperature zones fused into one zone at the upper part. This phenomenon was caused by
the differences of flame shape and flame height. The higher flame height resulted to the bigger high-
temperature zone. Comparing the temperature of gas and solid (Figure 7 c1 and c2 by M3, Figure 7 d1
and d2 by M4), the value of the maximum temperature is similar and the temperature distributions
have similar features. This may be partly due to the great thermal conductivity of the packed bed. The
heat transfer is controlled by the convection and radiation and is enhanced in this system. All the
pellets can quickly reach to the temperature of the gas.

Conclusions
In this paper, the methane non-premixed diffusion combustion in a packed bed were simulated using
four different methods and the flame shape and height were compared with the results of experiment
and other researchers’ simulation. Based on the simulation results, we find the appropriate numerical
simulation methods for combustion in packed bed are method M2 and M3. The major conclusions are
summarized as follows.
(1) The flame front of non-premixed diffusion combustion in the packed bed can be characterized
based on the chemical equivalent ratio of oxidant to fuel. In this model, it was reasonable to select the
zone between contour lines of mass fraction of O2 equals 0.48 and CH4 equals 0.04.
(2) Using CFD coupled with DEM, the fluid-particle interaction force Ffp calculated considering the
drag force and pressure gradient force is smaller than that calculated by Ergun equation, which results
in the gas flow velocity magnitude in the particle packed bed simulated by CFD-DEM are larger than
that by Ergun equation. For the same value of Ffp, the gas velocities in the packed bed simulated using
porous media model are smaller than those by DEM-CFD because the total pores volume calculated by
DEM is smaller than that by porous media.
(3) The flame heights simulated by M2 and M3 are10% lower than the experimental values. In
contrast, the values simulated by M1 and M4 were higher than the experimental values because of
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 11

Figure 7. Gas temperature distribution calculated (a) by M1, (b) by M2, (c1) by M3 and (d1) by M4, particles’ temperature (c2) by M3
and (d2) by M4.

different fuel and gas flow velocity in the packed bed. The maximum combustion temperatures
simulated by M2 and M3 are lower than those by M1 and M4. Only M2 and M3 can be used to
reasonably predict the flame height of gas combustion in the packed bed.
(4) In order to save the calculating time and resources, the packed bed of industrial engineering can
be simplified as a porous medium, and the fluid-particle interaction force should be calculated by
CFD-DEM method. The simulation methods of M2 and M3 need to be verified by engineer packed bed
combustion. The combustion efficiency and NOx formation mechanism need to be examined in the
future works.
12 C. CHEN ET AL.

Nomenclature
x Coordinate of x, m
y Coordinate of y, m
z Coordinate of z, m
ug Velocity of gas, m/s
up Velocity of particle, m/s
t Time, s
p Pressure, Pa
Ffp Total fluid-particle interaction force, N/m2
g Gravitational acceleration, N/kg
Tg Gas temperature, K
Tp Particle temperature, K
Cg Gas specific thermal capacity, J/(g·K)
Cp Particle specific thermal capacity, J/(g·K)
Qfp Particle-gas heat transfer flow, W
Qrad Radiative heat transfer flow, W
Qconv Convective heat transfer flow, W
ER Activation energy, J/mol
AR, Pre-exponential factor, m3/(mol·s)
Re Reynolds number
ffp,i Fluid-particle interaction force on the i-th particle, N/m2
fD,i The viscous drag force on the i-th particle, N/m2
fP,i Pressure gradient force on the i-th particle, N/m2
d Particle diameter, mm
l Vertical length, m
keff The effective thermal conductivity of gas, W/(m·K)
kp Particle thermal conductivity, W/(m·K)
Deff The diffusion coefficient of the i-th species, m2/s
Yi Mass fraction of the i-th species
YCH4 Mass fraction of CH4
YO2 Mass fraction of O2
Wi Molecular weight of the i-th species, kg/mol
Ri Reaction rate of the i-th species, mol/s
Np The number of particles in a CFD cell
Hi Flame height simulated by different method, mm
Hexp. Flame height calculated by experiment test, mm
Cµ The empirical constant of the turbulence model

Greeks
ρg Density of gas, kg/m3
ρp Density of particle, kg/m3
φ Porosity of packed bed
µ0 Gas molecule viscosity, Pa·s
µt Gas turbulent viscosity, Pa·s
µeff The effective viscosity of gas, Pa·s
α Permeability of porous medium
β Empirical coefficient for drag force
γ The relative error of flame height
κ The turbulent kinetic energy
ε The turbulent kinetic energy dissipation
εr The emissivity of particle surface

Author contributions
Conceptualisation, Meijie Zhang and Huazhi Gu; Numerical simulation: Chizhao Chen and Chang Yu; Writing and
original draft preparation, Meijie Zhang, Haifeng Li, Chizhao Chen and Yuntao Qu; Analyzing results: Meijie Zhang,
 ENERGY SOURCES, PART A: RECOVERY, UTILIZATION, AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTS 13

Haifeng Li, Chizhao Chen and Tingshou Li; writing, review and editing, All. All authors have read and agreed to the
published version of the manuscript.

Competing interests statement

Conflicts of interest: none.

Funding
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant No.51204126) and the Scholarship
Fund of China Scholarship Council (CSC) (No. 201808420323).

ORCID
Meijie Zhang http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3630-819X
Haifeng Li http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1953-1210

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