Simulation of turbulent slurry pipe flow using a two-fluid model based on the Kinetic Theory of Granular Flow: analysis of the influence of the modelling sources of uncertainty and comparison with experimental data

Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is useful in hydrotransport technology, avoiding the high costs and challenges of laboratory tests. Two-fluid models help obtain relevant engineering information with acceptable computational burden by treating liquid and solid phases as interpenetrating continua in the Eulerian framework. However, these models require suitable constitutive relations, closures, and boundary conditions to accurately capture the key physical processes driving slurry transport. This study identifies and discusses relevant modelling uncertainties of two-fluid models for turbulent slurry pipe flows in which both turbulent dispersion and particle-particle collisions are important.