Computer Simulation of Heat Transfer in a Rotary Lime Kiln

In the present work, a steady-state, finite difference-based computer model of heat transfer during production of lime in a rotary kiln has been developed. The model simulates calcination reaction in the solid bed region of the rotary kiln along with turbulent convection of gas, radiation heat exchange among hot gas, refractory wall and the solid surface, and conduction in the refractory wall. The solids flow countercurrent to the gas. The kiln is divided into axial segments of equal length. The mass and energy balances of the solid and gas in an axial segment are used to obtain solids and gas temperature at the exit of that segment. Thus, a marching type of solution proceeding from the solids inlet to solids outlet arises. To model the calcination of limestone, shrinking core model with surface reaction rate control has been used. The output data consist of the refractory wall temperature distributions, axial solids and gas temperature distributions, axial percent calcination profile, and kiln length. The kiln length predicted by the present model is 5.74 m as compared to 5.5 m of the pilot kiln used in the experimental study of Watkinson and Brimacombe (1982, Watkinson, A.P. and Brimacombe, J. K., “Limestone Calcination in a Rotary Kiln,” Metallurgical Transactions B, Vol. 13B, pp. 369–378). The other outputs have been also satisfactorily validated with the aforementioned experimental results. A detailed parametric study lent a good physical insight into the lime making process and the kiln wall temperature distributions.