CHARGE CONVECTED IN HIGHLY TURBULENT FLOWS - EXPERIMENTS ON TANKER UNLOADING

It is a known fact that very high potentials can be generated during t he flow of dielectric liquids, especially for hydrocarbons and liquefi ed gas. For such liquids the flow is highly turbulent. In the first pa rt of this study, the mechanism of charge formation is analyzed by tak ing the effect of the eddy diffusivity into account. These are two-pha se flows and the influence of the ratio liquid/gas on the charge gener ated is explored. The second part of the study is experimental. The el ectrical potentials generated during the various phases of the unloadi ng of a tanker are measured. A potential of approximately 3 kV is obse rved inside the pipe at the beginning of the unloading process.