About the book
Safe and efficient transportation of liquids carrying a burden of solids is a common industrial problem. Examples of the challenges posed by handling such media are many and various: tailings from mineral processing plants must be carried to reclamation ponds, wastewater from sewage overflows must be prevented from polluting inland waterways and, on a smaller scale, the rheology of human blood is of great interest in the manufacture of ducts and stents for implantation into human circulatory systems.
Unlike pure liquids, slurries transported in pipelines require a minimum velocity to maintain the suspension of entrained particles. These particles cause abrasion and wear in pumps, valves, and bends. Modeling and simulation of the flow of slurries give an important insight into the selection of these components of a pipeline system. For example, the Two-Layer Model indicates minimum velocity and pumping pressure to inform the choice of pump required for a given duty.
Not all mixtures of particles and liquids can be considered slurries. A slurry has its character quite different from the carrying liquid (sometimes referred to as the vehicle). A Newtonian liquid has its shear stress directly proportional to its rate of deformation, but this is seldom the case for a slurry. In general, slurries are referred to as non-Newtonian liquids and ways of dealing with them are important threads in this text.
Pipe blockages and pipe wear cause high costs to industry, in both maintenance and loss of production. This waste, and environmental damage which comes with it, can be shown to be reduced by careful application of slurry technology. This book will welcome recent research efforts to understand slurries related to the above-mentioned topics.
