Modeling Solids Dryers and Granulators

with Aspen Plus V8

Ajay Lakshmanan and Claus Reimers
Product Management, AspenTech

Solids Process Modeling Webinar

April 16, 2013
Hosted by:
Julie Levine and Ron Beck,
Product Marketing, AspenTech

© 2013
© 2013
Aspen
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Technology,
Technology,
Inc.Inc.
All All
rights
rights
reserved
reserved | 1
 Ongoing Series of Technical Webinars
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 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 4

 Why is Solids Modeling Important?

Specialty & Agricultural Chemical Process

Fertilizers, ChlorAlkali, pTA, Silicones

Reactions Separation Crystallization Drying Solid

Fluid Raw
(liquid/gas) (liquid/gas) (liquid/solid) (solids/gas) Product
Material

Fluids Solids + Fluids

Extractive Industry Process

Coal, Oil Sands, Cement, Phosphates, Alumina

Mineral Raw Separation

Material Grinding Classifying Reactions Fluid
(solids/liquid
(solids) (fluid/solid) (fluid/solid)
/gas)
Products

Solids + Fluids Solids + Fluids

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 5

Modeling Processes with Solids
Traditional Approach

Aspen Plus Urea

Synthesis Model

SolidSim Urea
Granulation Model

Two Models

Manual Data Transfer

Inconsistent Properties

Local Optimization

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 6

 AspenTech and SolidSim
Bringing Our Strengths Together

 Physical Properties  Solids Process Modeling

 Reactions & Electrolytes  Solids Characterization
 Fluid Unit Operations  Solids Unit Operations
 Integrated Workflows  Deep Expertise
 Worldwide Support  Relationship with universities
 University Program researching solids technology

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 7

 Aspen Plus V8.0
Optimizing Processes with Solids – Made Easy

Sample Online
Visualize PSD
Templates Training

Optimize Entire Process

10 Unit
Operations
© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 8
 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 9

 Why is Convective Drying Important?

 Problem: High
Energy
Consumption
 Benefit:
Optimizing design
and operation
reduces energy use
by 25-30%

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 10

 11
Convective Drying – Drying Curves

Drying periods
 Initial period
Heat the wet solids

 Constant rate period

1st Drying period
– Dry moisture on surface
– Moisture content above
critical moisture content

 Falling rate period

2nd Drying period
– Dry moisture inside particles
– Moisture content below
critical moisture content and
above equilibrium moisture
content
– Ends at equilibrium moisture
content

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 11

 Convective Drying – Model Description

 Flow patterns
– Co-current
– Counter-current
– Cross-current
 Solids in plug flow in axial, ideally mixed
in lateral direction, gas in plug flow
 Solids ideally mixed, gas in plug flow

 Drying model
– Based on drying kinetics
– Normalized drying curve describes falling rate drying
– Mass transfer coefficient between particles and gas:
 Sherwood number
 Mass transfer coefficient
 Product of mass transfer coefficient and surface area
 Number of Transfer Units
– Heat Transfer Coefficient user defined or calculated

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 12

 Normalized Drying Curve

 Normalized drying curve describes the falling rate period

Normalized drying rate Normalized moisture content

current drying rate X  X eq X: Current moisture content

v( )   Xcr: Critical moisture content
drying rate 1st drying period X cr  X eq Xeq: Equilibrium moisture content

Normalization

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 13

 How is the Normalized Drying Curve
Determined from Measured Data?

 The normalized drying curve is typically derived from

experiment data

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 14

 How is the Normalized Drying Curve
Determined from Measured Data?
 Step 1: Determine critical moisture content, equilibrium moisture content

– Current case
 Critical moisture content: Xcrit = 0.1 kg/kg
 Equilibrium moisture content: Xequi = 0.005 kg/kg

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 15

 How is the Normalized Drying Curve
Determined from Measured Data?

 Step 2: Calculate the drying rate and determine the drying rate at the 1st
drying period

– Current case
 Constant drying rate: MI = 1.65 g/(kg*s)

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 16

 How is the Normalized Drying Curve
Determined from Measured Data?

 Step 3: Calculate normalized drying rate and normalized moisture content

current drying rate X  X eq

v( )  
drying rate 1st drying period X cr  X eq

 Critical moisture content: Xcrit = 0.1 kg/kg

 Equilibrium moisture content: Xequi = 0.005 kg/kg

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 17

 18
Convective Dryer Forms Define critical
Drying Curve Tab and equilibrium
moisture content
Define
normalized
drying curve via
tabular data or
use of a function

Normalized
Normalized drying rate
moisture
content

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 18

 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 19

 Convective Drying – Fluidized Bed Dryer

 The following example will demonstrate how a multi-chamber

fluidized bed dryer could be modeled with Aspen Plus

Live
Demo

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 20

Convective Drying – Fluidized Bed Dryer –
Summary

– Aspen Plus can be used to model fluidized bed dryers

with multiple drying chambers
– Beside the drying of the material also entrainment and
gas-solid separation can be considered in an Aspen Plus
model
– Model shows the behavior of the overall drying process
 Temperatures
 Moistures
 Flow rates
 Particle size distributions
– Model gives information's about the internal streams in
the dryer that normally could not be measured

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 21

 Convective Drying – Belt Dryer

 The following example will demonstrate how a Belt Dryer

could be modeled and optimized with Aspen Plus
– Modeling of a complex apparatus
 Several drying zones with profiles of air recirculation and
temperature along the dryer
 Cooling zone with heat recovery

preheated make-up air

ambient air
Humid exhaust air

zone 1 zone 2 zone zone zone cooling zone

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 22

 Convective Drying – Belt Dryer

 Drying of Solids
– Solids are dried from ~261 g/kgdry to less than 11 g/kgdry by use of a 4
chamber belt dryer with internal air recirculation
 In the current setup the dryer has an energy consumption of 561 KW-Hr/ton
product
 approx. 93% of that heating energy is provided by the primary heater

 Objective:
– Reduce the energy demand of the dryer by at least 10%

 Constraints:
– Throughput should be unchanged (~ 2 t/h)
– Solids Temperature profile along the dryer should be mostly unchanged
– Product moisture should be less than 11 g/kgdry

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 23

Belt Dryer Demonstration

Live
Demo

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 24

Convective Drying – Belt Dryer – Summary

– Aspen Plus can be used to model Belt Dryers with multiple

drying and cooling chambers
– Temperature and moisture profiles along the dryer can be
calculated
– Model can be used to optimize the energy demand of an
industrial Belt Dryer by
 Investigate the impact of cooling stages
 Determining optimal flow rates and temperature

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 25

 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 26

 Why is Granulation Important?

 Problem: Product
quality and process
stability variability
 Benefit:
– Improve coating
and product
purity
– Increase
throughput

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 27

 Granulation

 Growth of particles due to deposition of solid material on

primary particles (seeds)

– Granulation: Seed and deposited solids are the same material

– Coating: Seed and deposited solids are different materials

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 28

 Agglomeration

 Agglomeration: Aggregation of two or more primary particles

– Agglomeration by use of a binder

 Binder could be water, a suspension, solution or melt
 Particles are ‘glued together’

– Agglomeration by use of mechanical forces

 No binder is added
 Particles are ‘pressed together’

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 29

 Modeling Agglomeration and Granulation

 The Aspen Plus Granulator can be used for:

– Granulation and Coating

Drum Fluidized Bed Plate

– Agglomeration
 using binder

Drum Fluidized bed Plate

 using mechanical forces

Compacting Press
Roller Agglomerator

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 30

 Granulation – Model

 Particle Growth
– Population balance
– Mixed
 Ideal mixing in radial and axial direction
 Growth rate proportional to
– Surface, Volume or Diameter
– Plug flow
 Ideal mixing in radial direction
 No mixing in axial direction

 Drying of particles
 Define solids moisture content at the outlet

 Entrainment in Fluidized Beds

 Upstream gas velocity
 Terminal velocity of the particles

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 31

 Agglomeration – Model
 Particle Growth
– Population balance
– Growth rate described by kernels
– Time-dependent part b0(t)
– Parameterize using experimental data
– Flux number approach used for fluidized
bed
– Size-dependent part b(u,v)
– Several models implemented
– Ideal mixing for radial and axial direction
– Pure binary agglomeration is assumed

 Drying of particles
 Define solids moisture content at outlet

 Entrainment in Fluidized Beds

 Upstream gas velocity
 Terminal velocity of the particles

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 32

 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 33

 Agglomeration Example

 The following example will demonstrate how a fluidized bed

agglomerator could be modeled with Aspen Plus
– Flux number approach is used to obtain the time part of the
agglomeration kernel

Live
Demo

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 34

 Agglomeration Summary

 Aspen Plus can be used to model

fluidized bed agglomerators
 The use of the Flux number
approach allows calculating the
time-dependent part of the
agglomeration kernel based on
operating conditions
– Binder flow rate and superficial
gas velocity have a direct
influence on the product particle
size distribution

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 35

 Granulation Example

 The following example will demonstrate how a industrial

granulation process can be simulated and optimized with
Aspen Plus
– Simulation of a granulation process with external
classification/grinding circuit and product cooling
– Optimization study to increase throughput
Live
Demo

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 36

 Granulation Summary

 Aspen Plus can be used to model industrial

granulation processes with external classification
and grinding circuit
 Multi-chamber granulators can be described by
use of a hierarchy block
– Information about internal streams can be obtained
 Model can be used to optimize the process with
regard to
– Throughput
– Product quality
– …

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 37

 Agenda
 Introduction
 Convective Drying
 Demonstration 1
 Belt and Fluidized Bed Drying
 Granulation
 Demonstration 2
 Granulation and Agglomeration
 Questions & Discussion

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 38

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 What Next?

 Get more information now

– Call your AspenTech account manager or
– Call Aspen Telesales Direct:
 USA: +1-855-882-7736
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– Presentations, videos, and getting started resources available at:
www.aspentech.com/products/solids-aspen-plus.aspx
– Videos also available at: www.youtube.com/user/aspentechnologyinc

 Contact info for today’s presenter and hosts

– Ajay Lakshmanan [email protected]
– Claus Reimers [email protected]
– Ron Beck [email protected]
– Julie Levine [email protected]

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 41

Questions

© 2013 Aspen Technology, Inc. All rights reserved | 42