NUMERICAL STUDY ON THERMAL DESTRATIFICATION IN LARGE SCALE HYDROGEN PROPELLANT TANK IN SPACE BY JET INJECTION UNDER ZERO GRAVITY CONDITION

Liquid Hydrogen plays a vital role in the future energy system as a space propellant, but it is sensitive to heat leakage from the environment because of its low boiling point and easy evaporation. On the other hand the buoyancy convection in the space microgravity environment is significantly reduced. When there is local heat leakage on the wall of the propellant tank, temperature stratification arises around the heat leakage source causing local overheating. It seriously affects the multiphase heat and mass transfer in the propellant tank which induces the tank pressure rise and jeopardize the structural safety of the system. To prevent the tank pressure from rising above the design of limits, venting or active pressure control techniques must be implemented. The cryogenic jet mixing is an effective means to suppress temperature stratification. The cryogenic fluid is mixed with the fluid inside the tank through a jet nozzle to reduce the local high temperature and achieve uniform temperature. In present paper, the thermal stratification phenomenon caused by the local heat leakage under microgravity condition was numerically simulated by using a fully filled two-dimensional large scale tank model. This paper mainly analyzes the suppression and elimination of local thermal stratification caused by heat leakage near the bottom of the storage tank and the outlet connecting section. The influence of different cryogenic jet mixing conditions on eliminating the temperature stratification effect is analyzed. The results show that the position of jet nozzle has no obvious effect on the elimination of thermal stratification inside the tank when the circular jet nozzle is used and the cryogenic jet condition is the same. When the jet nozzles are located in the same relative position inside the tank and the incident flow rate is the same, the circular jet nozzles have more concentrated flow direction, the flow field in the tank evolves faster, so the thermal stratification elimination effect is better than the hemispherical jet nozzles.