Evaluation of Turbulence Models for Predicting Buoyant Flows

Experimental data for the buoyant axisymmetric plume are used to validate certain closure hypotheses employed in turbulence model equations for calculating buoyant flows. Closure formulations for the turbulent transport of momentum, thermal energy, kinetic energy, and squared temperature used in the k–ε and algebraic stress models are investigated. Experimental data for the mean velocity, mean temperature, and kinetic energy are used in the closure formulation to obtain Reynolds stresses, heat fluxes, etc., which are then compared with their measured values.