Revista de Ingeniería

revinge | eISSN 2011-0049 | ISSN 0121-4993

Evaluation of a Dissolved Air Flotation System for Different Operating Conditions

No. 41 (2014-07-01)
  • Juan Carlos Berrío
    (1) Masters Student in Chemical Engineering. jc.berrio875@uniandes.edu.co.
  • Jorge López
    (2) Masters Student in Chemical Engineering. je.lopez1887@uniandes.edu.co.
  • Paola Cristancho
    (3) Undergraduate Student in Chemical Engineering. pm.cristancho1239@uniandes.edu.co.
  • Juan Gallo
    (4) Undergraduate Student in Chemical Engineering. jp.gallo56@uniandes.edu.co.
  • Esteban Guerrero
    (5) Masters Student in Product and Process Design. e.guerrero911@uniandes.edu.co.
  • Nicolás Ratkovich
    (6) Ph.D., M.Sc., Assistant Professor. n.rios262@uniandes.edu.co.
https://doi.org/10.16924/riua.v0i41.704

Abstract

The Dissolved Air Flotation (DAF) system is a water treatment process that uses physical and chemical processes to remove suspended solids from water streams. The aim of this article is to put forward a new design for the DAF equipment system that includes an extra air diffuser in the separation zone, and to find optimal operating conditions to make water more acceptable for an end-use. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) were used to assess three operating conditions with the new equipment design, which led us to conclude that case III offers better separation results due to the presence of stratified flow.

Keywords: Air diffusers, CFD, contact zone, DAF, separation zone