CFD Modelling of 3-Way Catalytic Converters with Detailed Catalytic Surface Reaction Mechanism

This paper presents a 3-D CFD modelling of flow and heterogeneous reactions in catalytic converters. The pressure and velocity fields in the catalytic converters are calculated by the state of the art modelling technique for the flow resistance of catalyst substrate. A surface reaction model is applied to predict the performance of a three-way Pt/Rh catalyst. A reaction mechanism with detailed catalytic surface reactions for the 3-way catalyst is applied. The novelty of this approach is the use of a surface chemistry solver coupled with a 3-D CFD code in the entire computational domain of the catalyst substrate that allows flow distribution for complex configurations to be accounted for. The concentrations of the gas species and the site species are obtained. A comparison between the simulation results and the experimental data of a three-way catalyst was made.