Numerical and experimental investigation on the in-flight melting behaviour of granulated powders in induction thermal plasmas

An innovative in-flight glass melting technology with thermal plasmas was developed for the purpose of energy conservation and environment protection. In this study, modelling and experiments of argon-oxygen induction thermal plasmas were conducted to investigate the melting behaviour of granulated soda-lime glass powders injected into the plasma. A two-dimensional local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) model was performed to simulate the heat and momentum transfer between plasma and particle. Results showed that the particle temperature was strongly affected by the flow rate of carrier gas and the particle size of raw material. A higher flow rate of carrier gas led to lower particle temperature and less energy transferred to particles which resulted in lower vitrification. The incomplete melting of large particles was attributed to the lower central temperature of the particle caused by a larger heat capacity. The numerical analysis explained well the experimental results, which can provide valuable practical guidelines for the process control in the melting process for the glass industry.