The computational fluid dynamics model with porosity and drag coefficient was used to describe fluid flow in an axial flow fixed bed according to the characteristics of fluid flow in the fixed-bed of the reactor. The commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code CFX was used to simulate the flow field in the axial flow fixed bed.The simulation predictions are in good agreement with experimental results of a large cold model. The influence of gas distributor on the flow field in the axial flow fixed bed was studied. A suitable gas distributor was used to attain less than 0.06 kPa radial pressure difference and less than 5.2% radial velocity difference in fixed bed.
