Preprint 2016-29
Sophie Balemans, Raimund Bürger, Stefan Diehl, Pierre Francois, Julien Laurent, Florent Locatelli, María Carmen Martí, Ingmar Nopens, Elena Torfs, Peter Vanrolleghem:
Concentration-driven models revisited: Towards a unified framework to model settling tanks in water resource recovery facilities
Abstract:
A new perspective on the modelling of settling behaviour in water resource recovery facilities (WRRFs) is introduced. The ultimate goal is to describe in a unified way the processes taking place both in primary and secondary settling tanks for a more detailed operation and control. First, experimental evidence is provided pointing out distributed particle properties (such as size, shape, density, porosity, flocculation state…) as an important common source of distributed settling behaviour in different settling unit processes and throughout different settling regimes (discrete, hindered and compression settling). Subsequently, a unified model framework that considers several particle classes is proposed in order to describe distributions in settling behaviour as well as the effect of variations in particle properties on the settling process. The result is a set of partial differential equations (PDEs) that are valid from dilute concentrations, where they correspond to discrete settling, to concentrated suspensions, where they correspond to compression settling. Consequently, these PDEs model both primary and secondary settling tanks.
This preprint gave rise to the following definitive publication(s):
Sophie BALEMANS, Raimund BüRGER, Stefan DIEHL, Pierre FRANCOIS, Julien LAURENT, Florent LOCATELLI, María Carmen MARTí, Ingmar NOPENS, Elena TORFS, Peter VANROLLEGHEM: Concentration-driven models revisited: Towards a unified framework to model settling tanks in water resource recovery facilities. Water Science and Technology, vol. 75, 3, pp. 539-551, (2017).