The Numerical Simulation of LNG Sloshing with an Improved Volume Of Fluid Method

With the trend towards offshore LNG production and offloading, sloshing of LNG in partially filled tanks has become an important research subject for the offshore industry. LNG sloshing can induce impact pressures on the containment system and can affect the motions of the LNG carrier. So far, LNG sloshing was mainly studied using model tests with an oscillation tank. However, the development of Navier-Stokes solvers with a detailed handling of the free surface, nowadays allows the numerical simulation of sloshing. It should be investigated, however, how accurate the results of this type of simulations are for this complex flow problem. The present paper first presents the details of a numerical model, an improved Volume OF Fluid (iVOF) method. Comparisons are made with sloshing model test results. Based on the results, the following conclusions can be drawn: - The dynamics of sloshing in LNG tanks can be simulated numerically using an iVOF Navier-Stokes solver. - Several improvements have been made in the treatment of numerical spikes in the pressure signals, but still more improvements need to be made. - Qualitatively, the pressure pulses resulting from impacts against the LNG tank wall show a rather good agreement between experiment and numerical simulation. - Quantitatively, the differences with the experiment show that further detailed studies with respect to cell sizes and time steps are necessary.