Numerical simulation and experimental study of electrocoagulation grid flocculation tank

Abstract In recent years, electrocoagulation has been extensively studied on the removal of refractory pollutants. However, the application of electrocoagulation in actual flocculation tank is limited because of its high energy consumption, especially under the condition of large electrode plate spacing. In this study, the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software – ANSYS Fluent had been used to simulate the flow state of grid flocculation tank, for the purposes of optimizing the design parameters. The simulation results showed that vortex velocity gradient was stronger, the grid plate spacing was smaller when the velocity was 0.13 m s−1, perforation size was 25 × 25 mm, porosity was 31.25%. And the optimal grid plate spacing was 250 mm. Moreover, in order to prove the reasonableness of simulation results, the humic acid wastewater was treated by electrocoagulation process in the specific device which was built based on simulation results. The results showed that the optimal condition of orthogonal test were as follows: the initial pH was 8, the concentration of sodium chloride was 5 mmol L−1, the voltage was 15 V; and the power time was 60 min. This study greatly narrowed the grid plate spacing, optimized design parameters under the circumstances of strong turbulent intensity and provided a theoretical basis for the combination of electrocoagulation and hydraulic flocculation.