Skip to main content
European Commission logo print header

Dynamic evolution in froth flotation tanks

Objective

The purpose of DEFT (Dynamic Evolution in Froth Flotation Tanks) is to put the engineering of froth flotation on a firm scientific basis. Flotation, used widely as a separation technique in chemical engineering and minerals processing, constitutes the largest tonnage engineering operation in the world. This is important for Europe, because much of the engineering knowledge concerning design of flotation systems resides here: Europe is thus placed competitively with respect to the global flotation industry. In spite of this, many of the models currently in use for flotation vessel design have serious scientific limitations. Most are kinematic in origin, requiring a priori knowledge of froth behaviour around the system boundaries, and leading to a lack of self -consistency in establishing the flow domain.

This limits their predictive capacity, enormously and wastefully prolonging the design cycle. DEFT will deliver the next generation of flotation models, which will be dynamic in nature, taking full account of t he forces (momentum, gravitational, driving pressure and rheological) producing the motion of the froth: the dynamic evolution of flotation from start-up until steady state operation will be followed. DEFT will also treat the fundamental physicochemical stability properties of the froth, using this information to compute the flow domain in a self-consistent fashion. The new generation models will be tested experimentally employing sophisticated image processing tools, and the findings made available for the benefit of the flotation community.

Call for proposal

FP6-2002-MOBILITY-7
See other projects for this call

Coordinator

THE UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER
EU contribution
No data
Address

MANCHESTER
United Kingdom

See on map

Links
Total cost
No data