Hydrodynamic effects during Waste cooking oil

transesterification using CFD

Adeyemi, Nabeel A#1, AKM Mohiuddin#2, Tariq Jameel*3
#
Mechanical Engineering Department,
International Islamic University, Malaysia
1
adeyemi.nabeel@student.iium.edu.my
2
mohiuddin@iiu.edu.my

*
Biotechnology Engineering Department
International Islamic University, Malaysia
2
atjameel@iiu.edu.my

Abstract - This work is presented as part of a preliminary study
to model transesterification of Waste Cooking Oil (WCO). A
Computational Fluid dynamics (CFD) technique was used to
simulate flow of WCO in a 2 Litre reactor. A turbulent model of
the Naviers Stokes' equation was used to solve the transient form
of the equation for an axisymmetrical 2-D model and the effect of
different impeller bottom distance and baffle were analyzed.
Peak mean turbulence energy and dissipative energy rate were
recorded at impeller bottom clearance C=0.23T for both baffled
and unbaffled system. This provides a basis for a proposed
dynamic modelling of transesterification WCO.
Keywords - Transesterification, waste cooking oil, CFD, mixing
I. INTRODUCTION
The conversion of waste cooking oil (WCO) to biodiesel
has presented the opportunity to prove the zero-waste property
of the oil palm, particularly in Malaysia which is the leading
producer of palm oil in the world. WCO, a by-product of palm
oil, has little or no food value as a result of its degraded
culinary properties, hence it has been advocated as a veritable
biodiesel production raw material (Ayhan 2009). Mixing
plays an important role during non-homogenous conversion of
WCO to biodiesel (Baldyga, Henczka et al. 2001; Nienow and
Bujalski 2004; Laurenzi, Coroneo et al. 2009), as the
characteristics of mixing of non homogenous fluid varies due
to changing rheological properties, hence the need to gain
detailed knowledge of fluid flow in stirred tanks for
transesterification of WCO.
Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) methods based on the
Naviers–Stokes equation has become a powerful tool for
studying fluid flow in stirred tanks and reactive mixing where
turbulent models have been extensively used to investigate the
complex flow structures for different impellers and baffle
systems (Gogate, Beenackers et al. 2000; Stitt 2002; Farmer,
Pike et al. 2005). An advantage of CFD based method is that
the fundamental equations governing fluid flow are solved for
complex geometries and thus the scaling up and scaling down
problems are reduced in order to arrive at an optimum mix.
The mixing mechanisms are determined by variables such as
impellers number and positions, impeller diameter/ vessel
diameter ratio, bottom clearance, bottom shape, baffles and
mixing intensity (Baldyga, Henczka et al. 2001; Montante,
Lee et al. 2001; Szalai, Kukura et al. 2004). Hence, with
application of CFD hydrodynamics during reactive mixing are
acquired (Akiti, Yeboah et al. 2005) to establish its effect the
on the kinetic of reaction (Hjertager, Hjertager et al. 2002).
Transesterification of WCO has been vigorous reported
(Zhang, Dube et al. 2003; West, Posarac et al. 2008; Ayhan
2009). The reaction terminates early, from observed
laboratory studies (Darnoko and Cheryan 2000), as a result of
mass transfer and kinetics limitation (Zhang, Dube et al. 2003;
Slinn and Kendall 2009) and partly linked to the
hydrodynamics during the mixing (Baldyga, Henczka et al.
2001). This has been understood, in part, to explain the early
termination of transesterification of WCO. Reactor
configuration has also been found to affect chemical reaction
kinetics(Freedman, Pryde et al. 1984; Noureddini and Zhu
1997) with particular reference to baffle, impeller and speed
of stirring (MA, Clements et al. 1999; Szalai, Kukura et al.
2004; Leevijit, Tongurai et al. 2008). Curiously, among the
various studies on transesterification, mixing seems to be least
discussed.
Hence, the paper presents a numerical simulation of WCO
flow in stirred tank using a 2-D model of a 2-Litre reactor for
estimating kinetic data in transesterification of WCO. The
Multiphysics coupling of the flow to the reaction is excluded
from this presentation
II. PROBLEM DEFININTION
In this work, the WCO flow is at described viscosity,
density and temperature during transesterification (Gouw and
Vlugter 1964; Morad, Idrees et al. 1995; Narváez, Rincón et 
∂κ ηT 
al. 2008). The flow model combines the conservation of mass −∇ . η +
ρ ∇κ +ρ κ
∇
U. =
and momentum equations to develop the necessary flow ∂t  σκ 2
( )
equations describing the physical model used. The 1 T
conservation of mass and momentum transport were modelled ηT U∇+ U.∇ −ρε ( )
using the κ- ε model of Naviers Stokes' equation for 2
incompressible fluid. This model is known to give better
prediction of highly turbulent flows for Rushton impeller ∂ε  ηT 
(Aoyi and Onyango 2008). ρ −∇ . η + ∇ε +ρ ε
∇
U.
∂t
 σ ε

( )
2
ε T 2 ε
( )
1
= Cε 1 ηT U ∇+ U. ∇ −ρ εC 1
2 κ κ
A. Governing Equations
For an axisymmetrical model the dependent variable related
The conservation of quantity φ is expressed as to the κ-ε model equation and the numerical values for the
∂ ∂ ∂  ∂  constants C µ , Cε 1 , Cε 2 , σ ε , σ κ are as in (Gouw and Vlugter
( ρϕ ) + ( ρu ϕ ) = Γ +S
 
i φ φ
∂t ∂xi ∂xi ∂xi
1964)

Where momentum, mass fraction, turbulent kinetic energy,

mass, velocity are substituted for φ. B. Boundary conditions and reference frame
1) Impeller
The flow is described by the Naviers Stokes' equation for
This is specified as a sliding wall. All velocity components
incompressible fluid
in the plane are zero, except that in the angular direction.
∇.u = 0 ww = ω × r
 ∂U
ρ ( )  = −∇π + ρ g + F
+ ∇. UU 2) Cylinder surface
 ∂t  No slip condition applied stating that all velocity
components equal zero:
u = (0, 0, 0)
Fcoriolis = 2ωV
Fcentrifugal = ω × ω × r 3) Axial symmetry
This specifies flow in the tangential direction of the
boundary but not in the normal direction with radial velocity
Where F in (3) for an axisymmetrical, 2D cross section to zero (MA, Clements et al. 1999)Referred for Equation 1 –
represents the force acting thru radial (r) and axial (z) co- 12
ordinates which are adopted as the body forces in the co- u=0
ordinates. Equation 4 and 5 accounts for the centrifugal and
coriolis terms as a result of the rotating reference frame
For the closure of the equation, κ- ε turbulent model is III. CFD METHOD
employed, which describes turbulent flow using the effective Since vegetable oil kinetic studies are usually done in a
viscosity and eddy viscosity assumption for a Newtonian laboratory reactor, a 2 litre stirred reactor with a Rushton
fluid, impeller was employed, with WCO as the working fluid. The
ηeff = η + ηT geometric details are as stated in table 1 and the stirring speed
for the impeller was chosen based on previous optimized
2
k transesterification data (Noureddini and Zhu 1997; Maa and
ηT = ρ C µ Hannab 1999). In this work, the reactor geometry is
ε
considered as rotationally symmetric. The velocities in the
The momentum transport and continuity of the
angular direction have a value different from zero, so the
incompressible fluids in a transient state.
model included all three velocity components, even though
the geometry is in 2D.
π, g and F are the molecular flux, gravitational and
acceleration force respectively while the transport equations
for κ-ε model are as follows; TABLE I
Stirrer reaction configuration
Impeller speed, rpm 600
impeller bottom clearance, C (mm) 0.11T-0.27T
 Height, H (mm) 150
Tank diameter, T (mm) 130
Total Liquid Height, L (mm) 0.34T
Impeller Diameter, D (mm) 0.23T

The CFD flow simulation was carried out by discrediting

the 2-D domain for fluid, impeller and baffle. At maximum
mesh size of 0.003 and 474 triangular mesh elements was
used for the discretizaton scheme. The flow solution was
obtained by solving the governing equations in COMSOL
Multiphysics 3.5 using the stationary segregated solver. All
simulations were carried out on a Dell Inspiron Desktop
equipped with an Intel (R) Core(TM) 2 Duo 2.80 GHz
processor and 3GB of random access memory (RAM).

IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

A. Hydrodynamics in Reactor
The simulated flow for the WCO (500g) was obtained
using COMSOL Multiphysics. 3.5a for a baffled and
unbaffled system. (Montante, Lee et al. 2001; Akiti, Yeboah
et al. 2005; Ochieng, Onyango et al. 2008) were referred
guide for this model. The limitation of this 2-D model has
been considered and represented as an approximate
comparison.
Figure 2: Simulated of swirl flow of WCO in 2L unbaffled reactor using
Rushton impeller at C=0.23T
The limitation considered is that the WCO does not cover
the entire volume of the tank like other works. There is no
recirculation above the impeller (Figs 1 and 2) for this
partially filled reactor compared to (Montante, Lee et al. 2001;
Aoyi and Onyango 2008) where a recirculation above the
impeller is reported. Fig 3a is the axial velocity profile of the
proposed model and in comparison Fig 3b (Aoyi and Onyango
2008) presents a degree of similarity.

Figure 3: Comparison of axial velocity profile (a) present work, (b)

Ochieng et al, 2008

Tangential, radial and axial Velocity flow field

Figure 1: This region of velocity measured is guided by (Montante, Lee
Simulated of et al. 2001) where the region closest to the impeller gave
swirl flow of better simulation prediction. The velocity profile at x=0.35T
WCO in 2L
baffled and x=0.19T for impeller bottom clearance, 0.11T, 0.17T,
reactor using 0.23T in the unbaffled system is presented in Fig 4. A similar
Rushton trend was observed for the baffled system. The effect of
impeller at clearance on tangential, radial and axial is as in Fig 5 for
C= 0.23T
unbaffled system. The velocity peaked at the x=0.23T and
dropped afterward. This was observed for both baffled and
unbaffled system. This was as similarly reported in (Aoyi and
Onyango 2008) where the systematic suppression of the lower
circulation loop while decreasing clearance from 0.4T to
0.15T led to a loss in momentum as the fluid hits the bottom
earlier before recirculation for reactor with liquid height .
Figure 4: Axial velocity profile for unbaffled reactor above (x=0.35T) and
below (x=0.19T) impeller at bottom distances, C (a) 0.11T (b) 0.17T (c)
0.23T
Although this is an axisymmetrical, 2D model, the trend of
the radial profile is similar as with the axial velocity of (Aoyi
and Onyango 2008). The mean turbulent kinetic energy
(maximum) and turbulent dissipation rate are also summarized
in Fig 6.
In literature, the Rushton impeller generates two
recirculation loops above and below it with the maximum
velocity close to the wall or baffle (Gogate, Beenackers et al.
2000). Our model represents a WCO flow of less than 500 mL
(< 50 mm liquid height). The recirculation loop is obviously
only below the impeller and results in subsequent sloshing on
the body the mixing. This profile is maintained after the
initiation of impeller motion. The described circulation in the
area below the impeller is only noticeable at x=0.223T in Fig
7 and 8 as reported in (Montante, Lee et al. 2001).
Figure 5: Simulated mean tangential, radial and axial velocity at impeller
bottom clearance, C= 0.11T, 0.15T, 0.19T, 0.23T and 0.27T
V. CONCLUSION
The simulation carried out was used to understand the
mixing flow in a 2 Litre tank for 500g of WCO. The 2 D
axisymmetrical model was solved in COMSOL Multiphysics
to show the hydrodynamic characteristics of the Rushton
impeller at different impeller bottom clearance. Turbulent
kinetic and dissipation rate energy peak at C=0.23T for both
baffled and unbaffled system. While this information is part of
a preliminary study and will be further compared and
validated with other turbulent models, the information
gathered would guide in modelling WCO transesterification
where stirring is recommended for an extended period beyond
the earliest completion time of reaction (Darnoko and Cheryan
2000). The stirrer might to be raised above this level, if not
completely withdrawn to allow the glycerol layer to settle.
The deliberate use of 500g WCO in the simulation was to be
able to know the flow dynamics and use the solution for
Multiphysics application of reactive flow simulation.
Although, the 2-D model still requires further validation, this
preliminary finding would be useful for multiphase mixing
during WCO transesterification.
 Figure 6: (a) Simulated mean turbulent kinetic and (b) dissipation energy
rate for baffled and unbaffled reactor at C=0.23T

Figure 7: 2-D cross Section of Turbulent Swirl

Flow of WCO in Unbaffled 2 Litre Tank at C=0.23T

Figure 8: 2-D cross Section of Turbulent Swirl Flow of WCO in baffled 2

iter Tank at C=0.23T

APPENDIX. NOMENCLATURE
C Impeller bottom clearance
F Force
g gravitational force
U average velocity field
V radial velocity
w tangential velocity
r tank radial co-ordinate
Sφ Momentum Source
T tank diameter
t time
Greek symbols
φ conservation quantity
ρ density
ω angular velocity
μ dynamic viscosity
κ turbulent kinetic energy
ε turbulent dissipation rate
η kinematic viscosity
π molecular flux
ww velocity
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