The complex nature of the physics of solid-gas interactions in concentrated solar particle heat exchangers signifies the need to develop new and cutting-edge numerical models to understand these interactions with the overarching goal of optimizing industrial solar thermal processes. To this end, a coupled computational fluid dynamics and discrete element method is developed to unravel near-wall particle flow physics of solar industrial heat exchangers. In addition, advanced post-processing functions are developed to provide a high-end data visualization and quantitative assessment of the packing distribution of solar particle heat exchangers. The validated numerical model shows that the particle temperature varies considerably throughout the entire fluid filled packed particle bed and it is shown that thermal radiation contribution becomes more profound at higher operating temperatures, namely 1073–1173 K. Also, the temperatures and solid volume fractions of the near-wall particles differ greatly compared to the bulk particles. The methods presented herein can be implemented by engineers and scientists to evaluate near-wall packing distributions and thermal characteristics, which would be useful for optimizing the geometric morphology of solar industrial heat exchangers.

聚光太阳能粒子换热器中固气相互作用物理学的复杂性意味着需要开发新的尖端数值模型来理解这些相互作用，从而实现优化工业太阳能热过程的总体目标。为此，开发了一种耦合计算流体动力学和离散元方法来解开太阳能工业热交换器的近壁粒子流物理。此外，还开发了先进的后处理功能，以提供太阳能粒子换热器填料分布的高端数据可视化和定量评估。经验证的数值模型表明，颗粒温度在整个充满流体的填充颗粒床中变化很大，并且表明在较高的工作温度（即 1073-1173 K）下，热辐射的贡献变得更大。此外，温度和固体体积分数近壁颗粒与体颗粒相比差别很大。本文介绍的方法可以由工程师和科学家实施，以评估近壁填充分布和热特性，这将有助于优化太阳能工业热交换器的几何形态。