Abstract The hydrodynamic properties of gas-liquid flows in water electrolyzers are of great practical interest since the local distribution of gas influences the amount of electrical energy required to produce hydrogen. We used the Euler-Euler model to simulate the multiphase flow in a water electrolyzer and compared the results to existing experimental data, for a range of current densities. Our study shows that if only the drag force and buoyancy force are incorporated in the model, the spreading of the gas layers formed at the electrodes is not accurately predicted. By adding the turbulence dispersion force to the model, reasonable agreement with the experimental data could be obtained for the higher current densities. The turbulence dispersion had to be implemented via user-defined functions, in order to obtain results that satisfied the momentum balance. In addition the effect of different turbulence models on the turbulent dispersion was investigated.

中文翻译：

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碱水电解槽中多相流的 CFD 建模

摘要 水电解槽中气液流动的流体动力学特性具有重要的实际意义，因为气体的局部分布会影响产生氢气所需的电能。我们使用 Euler-Euler 模型来模拟水电解槽中的多相流，并将结果与​​现有实验数据进行比较，以获得一定范围的电流密度。我们的研究表明，如果模型中仅包含阻力和浮力，则无法准确预测电极处形成的气体层的扩散。通过将湍流分散力添加到模型中，可以在更高的电流密度下获得与实验数据的合理一致。湍流分散必须通过用户定义的函数来实现，以获得满足动量平衡的结果。此外，研究了不同湍流模型对湍流分散的影响。