Blast furnaces remained the primary producer of hot metal iron despite the competition posed by alternating iron-making processes for the last 50 years. Possibly, when the hydrogen economy becomes a reality, its importance may fade sometime in the distant future. Mathematical modeling and simulation played a crucial role in gaining insights and thereby helped to optimize the process. Authors opine that commercial CFD packages do not offer enough flexibility to incorporate additional physics needed to develop simulation tools for complex processes like a blast furnace. Also, such solutions are not amenable to online deployment for use in operations. Thus, most of the models presented in the literature were developed from scratch by various researchers. However, these codes are neither efficient in computation, suitable for a parallel run nor better in robustness. In this context, to take advantage of new computational paradigms in terms of flexibility offered through open-source codes, in conjunction with parallelization, a comprehensive 2D blast furnace model has been developed using OpenFOAM^®. In essence, it has opened a new pathway towards achieving an online digital twin for a complex process such as a blast furnace. The researchers have used standard heat, mass, and momentum balance equations. However, equations do differ when it comes to reaction kinetics, melting phenomena, etc. In the present study, the melting model uses the beginning of softening and the end of melting temperatures to calculate the liquid fraction formed, which is linearly changing with temperature. This has resulted in improved convergence. The model equations and their implementation in OpenFOAM^® are presented in detail. As opposed to the prior art of the blast furnace simulation models, the present study demonstrates the grid independence, as well as the convergence of the fusion zone. The model predicts the size and shape of the cohesive zone and is shown to be capable of simulating various scenarios involving different burden distributions and other operating parameters through a parametric study.

尽管过去 50 年来交替的炼铁工艺带来了竞争，但高炉仍然是铁水的主要生产商。可能，当氢经济成为现实时，它的重要性可能会在遥远的将来某个时候消失。数学建模和模拟在获得洞察力方面发挥了至关重要的作用，从而有助于优化流程。作者认为，商业 CFD 软件包没有提供足够的灵活性来整合为高炉等复杂过程开发模拟工具所需的额外物理场。此外，此类解决方案不适合用于操作的在线部署。因此，文献中提出的大多数模型都是由各种研究人员从头开始开发的。然而，这些代码在计算上都没有效率，适合并行运行，鲁棒性也不好。在这种情况下，为了利用开源代码提供的灵活性方面的新计算范式，结合并行化，使用 OpenFOAM 开发了一个全面的 2D 高炉模型^®。从本质上讲，它为实现高炉等复杂工艺的在线数字孪生开辟了一条新途径。研究人员使用了标准的热量、质量和动量平衡方程。然而，当涉及到反应动力学、熔化现象等时，方程式确实有所不同。在本研究中，熔融模型使用软化开始和熔融结束温度来计算所形成的液体分数，该分数随温度线性变化。这导致了改进的收敛性。模型方程及其在 OpenFOAM ^{®中的实现}进行了详细介绍。与现有技术的高炉模拟模型相反，本研究展示了电网独立性以及融合区的收敛性。该模型预测了粘性区的大小和形状，并通过参数研究表明能够模拟涉及不同负荷分布和其他运行参数的各种场景。