Explosion suppression by a cloud of particles: Numerical analysis of the initial processes

In this paper, we pay attention to the problem of particle evacuation from a high-pressure region. This research was inspired by the known problem of the explosion suppression by a cloud of inert and solid particles. This issue has been so far investigated experimentally where the most important tasks have been to find the proper suppressant, estimate its quantity, as well as design the quenching device. Also some attention has been paid to numerical investigation where by use of computer simulation the same questions have been asked. In this paper, we focus on the numerical study, where the first moment of the suppressing process is analysed: the exact behaviour of the particle cloud as it interacts with the gas. A mathematical model is presented that bases on the Eulerian–Lagrangian approach for the description of the gas and solid phases. Finally, some results are shown: both snapshots of particle location as well as some statistics, such as particle cloud area and particle distribution within the cloud. According to the observations, we obtain different behaviour especially if the particle diameter varies. For some values the particles do not seem to be well-distributed and an example are smaller particles that tend to gather along the edges of the eddies formed in the gas phase.