Turbulent dispersion in bounded horizontal jets. RANS capabilities and physical modeling comparison

Accurate prediction of contaminant concentrations can yield improved outfall structures design,
reducing economical expenses and environmental impact. Conventionally, cost intensive physical modeling or simplified integral approach models have been employed despite their drawbacks and limitations. In the present paper, two jet setups have been studied by means of 3D Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes equations and experimental modeling. Both jet cases correspond to turbulent horizontal jets, bounded by the channel bed, which might be found in common environmental discharges. Three of the most widely employed turbulence models up to date have been investigated (namely standard k-ε, RNG k-ε and k-ω), analyzing their performance
on the jet trajectory estimation. For the best performance’s model, RNG k-ε and for both jets cases of
the present study, analysis has been extended to the turbulence diffusion estimation by defining a turbulent
Schmidt number.