The impacts of structural parameters on performance and energy loss of the supersonic separator: A sensitivity analysis

The supersonic separator uses pressure energy to achieve highly efficient carbon capture and water vapor separation from the natural gas mixture. Structural parameters are crucial in determining both separation performance and pressure energy loss of the supersonic separator. However, a comprehensive understanding of how them influence flow behaviors and performance is hindered by their coupling effects and the limitations of numerical methods. This study introduces Euler-Lagrange-Euler model to predict separation performance and pressure energy loss of supersonic dehydration process with varying structural parameters. The results show that the expansion ratio of the divergent section, length of the convergent section, inlet radius of the inner body, and throat radius of the inner body significantly impact separation performance and pressure energy loss. Especially the first parameter, the swirl strength and centrifugal acceleration decay to 0.044 and 2.41 × 104 m s−2 as it increases. At the same time, the droplet removal rate significantly improves, but the separation performance does not increase indefinitely due to the shock waves. The dehydration efficiency first increases to 95.09 % at 1.5 and then decreases; the dew point depression also expands to 25.28 K and then drops, and the corresponding pressure loss rises to 0.47 and then falls.