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DOE OSTI · 2496248

A High-Performance Discrete-Element Framework for Simulating Flow and Jamming of Moisture Bearing Biomass Feedstocks

Deak, Nicholas·Sitaraman, Hariswaran·Lu, Yimin·Saha, Nepu·Klinger, Jordan·Xia, Yidong
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Abstract

We developed and verified a high-performance open-source discrete element method (DEM) solver with simultaneously-supported feedstock-specific interaction models, including bonded-sphere, liquid bridge, cohesion, and non-linear contact models. Our solver uses parallel data structures on hybrid central and graphics processing unit (CPU/GPU) architectures, with favorable strong scaling performance observed for large problem sizes comprised of (100 M particles), and 4X single-node GPU speedup. The particles for corn stover feedstock were conceptualized and calibrated based on experimental measurements and results. Sensitivity analyses demonstrate that the mass flow rate from a wedge hopper is governed primarily by moisture content, friction coefficient, and cohesion energy density. The model is used to reproduce experimentally observed hopper jamming results, highlighting that the experimental no-flow trends can only be achieved by using non-spherical particles, liquid bridge and cohesion models, highlighting the importance of using concurrent feedstock specialized models for the effective representation of biomass material handling problems.

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bioenergyBIOMASS FUELScorn stovergranular flowmaterial handlingopen-source softwarewedge hopper

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Deak, Nicholas, Sitaraman, Hariswaran, Lu, Yimin, Saha, Nepu, Klinger, Jordan, Xia, Yidong. 2024-12-15. A High-Performance Discrete-Element Framework for Simulating Flow and Jamming of Moisture Bearing Biomass Feedstocks. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.powtec.2024.120548

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