Simulation of the transfer process in the blast furnace shaft with layered burden

A symmetric, two dimensional, steady state burden distribution model is proposed to simulate the flow of gases and solids in a blast furnace. The charged material is treated as porous media with alternating coke and ore layers of different permeability. Their heat transfer processes coupled with fluid flowing and chemical reactions are predicted by Fluent. To investigate the influence of the layered burden treatment on the calculated in-furnace condition, a mixed burden model, in which the charging materials are assumed as mixed layer of coke and ore, has also been developed with the same boundary condition except for the burden properties. The results indicate that the layered burden treatment has great influence on the calculated temperature distribution as well as the gas pressure distribution. Validation of the layered burden treatment has also been performed. The gas temperature at the furnace top as well as the gas pressure at the furnace wall are in good agreement with the measured data in the operating blast furnace. Obviously, a mathematical model that takes the layered structure into consideration is necessary to simulate the temperature and chemical reactions of materials in the blast furnace.