A novel static mixer for blending hydrogen into natural gas pipelines.

A novel static mixer is designed specifically to blend hydrogen into natural gas pipelines, and its effectiveness is validated by numerical simulation method. Firstly, the structural model of the proposed static mixer model for hydrogen-methane blending is introduced, and the evaluation indicators are defined. Secondly, the computational fluid dynamic model for the mixing process is established based on the Large Eddy Simulation(LES) method, and the accuracy of the numerical results is validated against the experimental data of a benchmark gas mixing model. Subsequently, using LES, effects structural parameters (angle and height of trapezoidal baffle, number of mixing elements, and spacing and installation distance of mixing elements) and flow parameters (main flow velocity and hydrogen blending ratio) on the mixing homogeneity and pressure drop of the static mixer are investigated systematically to explore the optimal design and operational conditions. The numerical results showed that the static mixer can significantly improve the mixing efficiency of hydrogen and natural gas with acceptable pressure loss. In the range of flow conditions concerned, a best performance of mixing could be obtained by installing the mixer at a distance of 3 D (D is the diameter of the natural gas pipeline) downstream the blending point, setting the spacing between mixing elements as 1 D and employing four mixing elements. Finally, the underlying physics of mass transportation are analyzed based on the vortex structures generated by the mixer. • A novel static mixer is designed to blend hydrogen into natural gas pipelines. • A Large eddy simulation solution procedure is proposed to solve multi-component mixing. • Effects of key parameters of the static mixer and operating conditions are revealed. • The mixing mechanism of static mixer is revealed based on vortex dynamics analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]