CFD Simulation of Holdup in Rotating Disc Contactor

The knowledge of dispersed phase holdup is of considerable importance for the design and scaling-up of rotating disc contactor (RDC). In this paper, the hydrodynamic characteristics of two-phase flow in a RDC were studied by means of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software. Two phases consisting of the dispersed phase (kerosene) and continuous phase (water) were introduced in countercurrent operation. The distribution of flow filed and the dispersed phase holdup was obtained, in addition, the changes of the dispersed holdup with two-phase superficial velocity and rotation speed were also discussed. The results from simulations and the experiment data of the published literature are in good agreement. The presented CFD predictions will provide a possible way to reduce hydrodynamic experiment and will contribute to better understanding of the hydrodynamic properties and mass transfer characteristics in RDC.