Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151 – 161

www.elsevier.com/locate/petrol

CFD simulation of homogenization in large-scale crude oil

storage tanks
Asghar Alizadeh Dakhel, Masoud Rahimi *
Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Razi University, Kermanshah, Iran

Received 10 July 2003; accepted 20 January 2004

Abstract

The homogenization time of two layers of crude oils obtained from different reservoirs in 19 000 m3 floating roof storage
tank is predicted using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The tank equipped with a side-entry 0.65 m marine-type mixer. An
in-house CFD code using Multiple Frame of Reference (MFR) and the renormalization group version (RNG) of k – e turbulent
model has been employed. The fluid region has been divided to 580 484 number of control volumes. The time variation of
density at three sampling points in the tank has been compared with corresponding points in the model. The results show a good
agreement.
D 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: CFD; Mixing; Homogenization; Crude oil; Storage tank

1. Introduction tracer at some locations in a vessel (usually a pulse

Blending or homogenization of two or more mis-
cible fluids is widely encountered in a variety of
chemical and petroleum processes. Proper mixing in
crude oil storage tanks can provide a homogeneous
feed for refinery distillation units. The heterogeneity
of the feed into the refinery may change the products’
characteristics and prices time by time.
The important process parameter for the blending
is the homogenization time, which is frequently
termed as the mixing time. Some experimental deter-
mination of the mixing time involves introducing of a
* Corresponding author. Fax: +98-83-142-46000.
E-mail addresses: asgharal@yahoo.com (A.A. Dakhel),
masoudrahimi@yahoo.com (M. Rahimi).
input) and measurement of the tracer concentration as
a function of time with the help of a sensor. Several
advanced experimental techniques are being concur-
rently developed for validation of CFD computational
predictions. For example, laser-Doppler anemometry
(LDA) (Mao et al., 1997), laser-Doppler velocimetry
(LDV) (Tiljander et al., 1997), laser-induced fluores-
cence (Distelhoff et al., 1997), and digital particle
image velocimetry (DPIV) (Myers et al., 1997, Sheng
et al., 1998) are used by investigators. However, all
these techniques are experimentally complex and
require relatively expensive equipment. In addition,
homogenization researches have been done on small
stirred tanks and less works have been done on
homogenization in large-scale tanks.
The blending process occurs because of the trans-
port at three levels: molecular, eddy, and bulk (con-

0920-4105/$ - see front matter D 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.petrol.2004.01.003
152 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161
vection). Over the years several approaches have been
proposed to model the mixing process. These
approaches are based on the above three mechanisms.
Paywardhan and Joshi (1999) classified all of the
approaches into four categories: circulation models,
eddy diffusion models, network of zones models and
CFD models. Circulation models inherently assume
that the blending process is controlled by the mean
flow, i.e., the bulk motion (Norwood and Metzner,
1960; McManamey, 1980; Joshi and Sharma, 1982).
Eddy diffusion models assume that the entire blending
process is controlled by eddy diffusion (Voncken and
Holmes, 1964; Hiraoka and Ito, 1977; Jahoda et al.,
1994). Two recently models, network of zones and
CFD, are far more realistic in comparison to the
circulation and eddy diffusion models, namely be-
cause they attempt to take into account the local flow
field.
In the network of zones models, according to the
geometry of the problem a 2-D network of zones is
formed at first. This 2-D arrangement of zones forms
the basis of axial/radial sections, which can be circum-
ferentially assembled and suitably interconnected into
a full 3-D model. This vertical slice of the vessel then
has exactly the same structure as its 2-D counterpart,
with a set of flow loops nested around foci of
circulation above and below the impeller. In other
words, the flow pattern has been predefined. A set of
equations can be generated from material balance
around each zone. The concentration of species can
be predicted by solving these equations. Turbulence
exchange between flow loops has been considered
using the b, B1and Br coefficients (Mann et al., 1994;
Rahimi et al., 2000; Rahimi and Mann, 2001).
Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) involves the
numerical solution of conservation equations for
mass, momentum and energy in flow geometry of
interest, together with additional equations reflecting
the problem at hand. During a CFD solution of a
problem, two steps should be covered. As a first step,
the space in which the problem is posed is notionally
divided into a solution mesh. Then the partial differ-
ential equations describing flow (including an appro-
priate form of Navier –Stokes) are discretised over the
mesh. This gives to a large set of nonlinear simulta-
neous equations. These equations can be solved using
numerous algorithms. Boundary and initial condition
must also be introduced to CFD. The selection of
turbulence models, which is required to describe the
influence of turbulence on the bulk flow properties of
the fluid, is another criterion that must be considered.
The most important part of modeling of mixing in
a tank equipped with a mixer (mixers) is the impeller
modeling. Three popular approaches for the model-
ing of the impeller are: ‘impeller boundary condi-
tion’, ‘ inner –outer iterative procedure’ and ‘sliding-
grid method’. These methods have been presented
for impeller modeling in cylindrical stirred tanks
(whose impeller is located vertically in the tank
center line), some of them can be used in tanks with
different geometry and conditions.
In the ‘impeller boundary condition’ method,
which is the most traditional approach, steady con-
ditions are imposed and simulations are conducted in
the reference frame. This method needs to have
empirically derived boundary conditions.
In the ‘inner – outer’ approach (Brucato et al.,
1994), the whole vessel volume is subdivided into
two partly overlapping regions. An ‘inner’ domain,
containing the impeller and an ‘outer’ one, contains
the rest of the vessel volume. In this method, a
fictitious cylindrical boundary with a radius interme-
diate between that of impeller blade tips and the
baffles edges will be defined. Then the flow solution
azimuthally will be averaged over this surface; the
resulting values are used as an outer boundary condi-
tion for a second simulation in the rotating frame.
Repeating this iteration process a number of times
should result in a converged steady state flow solu-
tion. A crucial feature of this approach is the existence
of an overlap region, common to the ‘inner’ and
‘outer’ regions, which provides the iterative matching
of the two solutions. The extent of this region and the
exact location of its boundaries are largely arbitrary.
By contrast, in the ‘multiple frame of reference’
(MFR) method proposed by Luo and Gosman
(1994), the ‘inner’ and ‘outer’ steady state solutions
are implicitly matched along a single boundary face,
and external iterations are not required; on the other
hand, the choice of this surface is not arbitrary, since it
has to be assumed a priori as a surface where flow
variables do not change appreciably either with the
tangential angle or with time.
In the ‘sliding-grid’ method (Luo et al., 1993), the
flow domain is divided into two cylindrical, non-
overlapping subdomains, each grided as a separate
 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161
block. The outer one is fixed, while the inner one
rotates with the impeller. In this method unlike the
previous methods, the simulation is carried out in
time-dependent fashion with the relative motion of the
meshes and the consequence for data transfer across
their common boundary taken into account. The two
regions are implicitly coupled at the interface separat-
ing the two blocks via a sliding mesh algorithm,
which takes into account the relative motion between
the two subdomains and performs the required se-
quence of dynamic interpolations.
Brucato et al. (1998) presented predictions of all
three of these methods for baffled tanks stirred by
single and dual Rushton turbines (radial impeller) and
also by a constant-pitch helical impeller (axial impel-
ler). They compared the predicted results with avail-
able experimental data from the literature.
Both of the MFR and sliding mesh can be theoret-
ically applied for our problem. However, because the
sliding mesh requires an unsteady numerical solution,
it is too time demanding for such cases.
Although plenty of CFD simulations have been
done on fluid hydrodynamics and mixing, most of
them focused on vertical mixers (Montante et al.,
2001; Alexopoulos et al., 2002) or jet mixing (Jayanti,
2001; Patwardhan, 2002) and less works have carried
out on side-entry mixers.
In this work, the numerical model employs a three-
dimensional CFD simulation incorporating turbulent
models for the fluid flow and mass transport in a
large-scale storage tank. The tank is equipped with a
side-entry marine-type impeller. Experimental inves-
tigations provide the necessary boundary conditions
and validation data for the computational model.
2. Area descriptions, methods and material studied
Mixing in a 13 m height
44 m diameter storage
tank of the Kermanshah refinery (west of Iran) has
been investigated. It has three places of sampling
located in 1.3, 6 and 12 m from the tank bottom.
The tank is equipped with a 0.65 m diameter three-
blade marine-type impeller placed 0.7 m from the tank
bottom. The impeller rotates at 450 rpm, in the way
that force the fluid in the forward direction. The
sample points are located 160j from the mixer in
the tangential direction. Figs. 1 and 2 show a picture
153
of the impeller and the tank, respectively. Also ap-
proximate locations of the sampling points are shown
in Fig. 2.
The tank receives feed from two reservoirs with
different densities. It was filled with 13 072 m3 of
Asmary crude oil and 6536 m3 of Naftshahr crude oil
(the naming is on the basis of the location of the
reservoirs). After charging was completed, the crude
oil has been kept stagnant in the tank for about 24 h,
for water and sediment draining. This time allowed
the different crude oils to be separated as two layers,
due to density difference. Then the mixer was turned
on and the density of the crude oil, taken from the
sampling points, was measured at several time steps.
In the theoretical part, the three-dimensional sim-
ulation has been carried out using an in-house CFD
code. The code enables the simultaneous solution of
the continuity and the Reynolds-averaged Navier –
Stokes (RANS) equations together with the RNG
(renormalization group) of k – e turbulence model.
This model was derived using a rigorous statistical
technique (called renormalization group theory). It is
similar in form to the standard k – e model presented
by Launder and Spalding (1974);
k2
leff ¼ l þ lT ; lT ¼ qCl ð1Þ
e
 
BðqkÞ leff
þ divðqk[Þ ¼ div grad k þ G  qe ð2Þ
Bt rk
 
BðqeÞ l
þ divðqe[Þ ¼ div eff grad e
Bt re
e e2
þ C1e 2leff Eij  Eij  C2e q
k k
ð3Þ
In the RNG – k –e model the effect of small-scale
turbulence is represented by means of a random
forcing function in the Navier – Stokes equations.
The RNG procedure systematically removes the
small scales of motion from the governing equations
by expressing their effects in terms of larger-scale
motion and a modified viscosity (the interest reader
154 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161

Fig. 1. The impeller.

can see Yakhot and Orszag, 1986; Versteeg and
Malalasekera, 1995 for more information about the
RNG theory). The constants that have been used in
the model are: C1e=1.42, C2e=1.68, Cl=0.0845,
re=1.30 and rk=1.00.
The MFR model has been employed in order to
model the impeller. The impeller region was separated
from other regions by a 0.55 m radius and 0.85 m
length cylinder and divided to 19 621 number of
control volumes. The rest of fluid region has been
meshed to 560 863 grids. An axial/radial slice of the
grid focused on the region close to the impeller is
shown in Fig. 3. The MFR region has been distin-
guished using a rectangle. As can be seen from this

Fig. 2. The storage tank and sampling point locations.

A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161 155

Fig. 3. A cross section of grid created in the MFR region and its neighborhood.

Fig. 4. A scheme of grid in a plane going through the impeller.

156 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161

figure, the mesh sizes around the MFR are smaller
than the other regions in the tank. A more complete
scene of this cross section is shown in Fig. 4. The
bottom region is also divided into smaller meshes for
more precise calculation. The rotation speed of im-
peller has been set to 450 rpm in the code.
3. Results and analyses
The simulation results can predict the velocity,
pressure, turbulent intensity field and any other fluid
dynamics features in 3-D region. In addition, the
unsteady distribution of the two types of crude oils
in the tank can be monitored with time. The hydro-
dynamic results in the steady state condition predict
that the most part of tank has a low velocity magni-
tude in a way that just 29% of the tank volume has a
velocity higher than 0.1 m/s. This region is a narrow
sector surrounding the impeller. The maximum veloc-
ity magnitude of 14.3 m/s has been reported close to
the impeller blades.
Fig. 5 illustrates the velocity vectors in a radial/
axial slice going through the impeller shaft. The arrow
presentation of the velocity illustrates the movement
of fluid from the impeller toward the front wall. It also
shows that the fluid slips on the front wall in upward
direction and continues to circulate toward the impel-
ler from the top of the tank. The region close to the
impeller is also magnified in the figure. It shows that
flow moves toward the impeller from above (in the
axial direction) in 2D plot and is directed toward the
front wall (in the radial direction). The larger number
of vectors close to the impeller is due to higher

Fig. 5. Velocity vectors on a vertical plane going through the impeller shaft using equal size arrow plot.
 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161 157

number of control volumes in the MFR region, as
discussed before.
Fig. 6 shows the top view of the velocity vector in
a horizontal plane going through the impeller and the
top of the tank. From Fig. 6a, the velocity vector
shows that the general flow pattern in the impeller
level is in forward direction from the impeller. As can
be seen in the figure, there is a narrow region in the
middle of the plane that the flow is completely in
forward direction. The interaction between the cir-
cumferential flow due to the wall impingement and
the forward flow cause a circulating flow in the right
and left hand sides. The flow pattern also shows that
the regions close to the impeller on both sides are

Fig. 6. Velocity vectors on horizontal planes at two different levels using equal size arrow plot: (a) at the level of the impeller shaft; (b) at the
level of 12.3 m from the bottom (close to the tank roof).
158 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161

influenced by the impeller suction and the fluid moves
toward the impeller. Fig. 6b shows the back flow
circulation from the top of the tank toward the
impeller.
Fig. 7 illustrates the velocity magnitude and its
three components in a horizontal line going through
the shaft from the impeller to the opposite wall. As it
is illustrated in Fig. 7a, the velocity magnitude by the
maximum value of 4.7 m/s in this line decreases by
distance from the impeller. It reaches to one third of its
maximum value just 3 m from the impeller. The
velocity becomes 0.5 m/s at a 20 m distance from
the impeller and finally the fluid travels the remaining
(23 m) with a velocity of less than 0.5 m/s. The more
precise analysis is shown in Fig. 7b– d, which illus-
trates the three components of velocity on the same
line. The radial component (from the impeller to the
front wall) with maximum value of 4.6 m/s close to
the impeller has a decreasing trend similar to the
overall velocity magnitude and next to the wall
becomes zero due to the completely change in veloc-
ity direction. The axial velocity (from bottom to top)
after short distance from the impeller is almost zero
along the mentioned line except close to the wall,
which the radial flow becomes axial due to wall
impingement. The third or tangential component of
velocity has also the value of zero in most places
along the line. The more noises in this direction can be
related to the RNG prediction in the tangential direc-
tion and the interaction of suction and discharge flows
close to the impeller. The comparison between the
velocity magnitude and its components obviously
shows that the dominate component of velocity, as
expected, is the radial one.
Fig. 8 describes the predicted and measured density
of samples taken from the three sample points at

Fig. 7. The velocity magnitude and its components in a line going through the impeller shaft: (a) velocity magnitude; (b) radial velocity
component; (c) axial velocity component; (d) tangential velocity component.
 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161 159

Fig. 8. The comparison between predicted (p) and measured (m) density of samples taken from sampling points.

various time steps. As it was mentioned before, the
volume of tank has been filled in the way that two
parts occupied by heavy crude oil (Asmary, with
density of 845 kg/m3) and one part by light crude
oil (Naftshahr, with density of 833 kg/m3). Therefore
sample points of point1 and point2 have been placed
in the region of heavy oil and point3 in the light oil
region. This can be seen from Fig. 8 at time zero,
which density is 845 kg/m3 for points 1 and 2 and 833
kg/m3 for point 3. After starting the impeller rotation,
the predicted results show an increasing trend of
density for point3. The site data also shows the same
trend. On the other hand, the densities of two other
points decrease with time. This figure shows that the
density of samples from points 1 and 2 are quite close
and no considerable difference can be seen for both
predicted and measured values. This relates to the
relative amount of the heavy oil to the light oil. The
figure also illustrates that the density differences
between the three points decrease with time in a

Fig. 9. The time-evolution of mixing of two types of crude oils inside the tank.
160 A.A. Dakhel, M. Rahimi / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 43 (2004) 151–161
way that a 12 unit maximum difference at the begin-
ning becomes about 4.5 after 1 h. In 3 h, it is difficult
to distinguish between the values of densities and after
three and half hours, complete homogenization has
been predicted from simulated data. The experimental
data validate the obtained results. The final density of
samples from the three sample points in Fig. 8 for
both experimental and theoretical results is 841 kg/m3,
which is expected from overall material balance at
perfect mixing. There is a small difference between
experimental and simulated data, which can be
avoided by increasing the number of control volumes.
This may become possible with the development of
computer hardwares in the near future.
The maximum density difference in the whole tank
has been used as a criterion for mixing progress.
Therefore, in complete mixing (homogenization time),
the maximum density difference in the whole tank
becomes zero. Fig. 9 illustrates the time-evolution of
distribution of two types of crude oils inside the tank.
The number of internal turnover time as a normalized
time scale has been used in this figure. The turnover
time is the average time required for a fluid element to
flow once around the tank. It is the ratio of the vessel
volume and pumping capacity of the impeller, V/Qp
The value of Qp can be calculated from total volu-
metric flow withdraw from the MFR region. The
value of 0.67 m3/s has been obtained as an average
value from the CFD code for Qp. Therefore the
average internal turnover time for fluid inside the tank
would be 2835 s. Fig. 9 illustrates that complete
mixing will be obtained after five internal turnover
times, which is in agreement with an old rule of thumb
in the literatures.
4. Discussion and conclusions
The reasonable agreement between simulated and
site data shows that the code can be used to
simulate large-scale systems such as storage tanks.
The MFR technique, which was developed for top
entry mixers, can be used for a side-entry mixer.
The dominate flow generated by marine type
impeller is axial.
A simple experiment can be used to validate
simulation results in large-scale cases instead of
impossible or expensive experiments.
Notation
C1e, C2e, Cl constants of the k – e model
G dissipation function, Pa s1
K turbulent kinetic energy J kg1
v mean velocity, m s1
Qp pumping capacity, m3/s
V volume, m3
Greek letters
e dissipation rate of k; w kg1
l, lT, leff laminar, turbulent and effective viscosities,
Pa s
q density, kg m3
rk, re constants of the k– e model
Eij linear deformation rate
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to express their thanks to the
Kermanshah refinery of Iran for the financial support
of this work.
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