Modeling the discontinuous liquid flow in a blast furnace

This article presents a mathematical model to describe the discontinuous flow of an isothermal liquid in packed beds, simulating in part the flow condition in and below the blast furnace cohesive zone. The model is developed based on a force balance approach to describe the discrete liquid flow and a stochastic treatment to take into account the complex packing structure. The interaction between gas and liquid flows has also been included in the governing equations, so that the localized liquid flow in a packed bed can be modeled with or without gas flow. The difference between the microscopic and macroscopic approaches is discussed, and it is argued that at this stage of development, liquid flow modeling should be conducted at the macroscopic level. Techniques for numerical solution are provided. The validity of the proposed model is demonstrated by comparing model predictions with measurements obtained using a two-dimensional cold model apparatus under different gas and/or liquid flow conditions.