NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF ECO BLUE BIN

The Eco Blue Bin is an innovative and environmentally friendly solution designed to tackle the growing issue of floating waste in marine and river environments. Positioned strategically at jetties, rivers, and marinas, the Eco Blue Bin functions as a trash collector that targets the accumulation of floating debris, bio- waste, and plastic bottles. These materials, often seen drifting in large quantities in water bodies, contribute significantly to environmental pollution, impacting not just the aesthetic beauty of these areas, but also posing serious threats to marine life and water ecosystems. With its ability to collect waste in these locations, the Eco Blue Bin is emerging as a potential game-changer for coastal and riverside communities, offering an efficient, sustainable, and low-maintenance solution for managing waste. What sets the Eco Blue Bin apart from other trash collectors is its unique design, which utilizes the Bernoulli principle to capture waste without the need for energy-consuming mechanisms. This principle works by generating a swirling flow in the water that naturally draws debris toward the collector, making it an energy-efficient solution. The Eco Blue Bin also incorporates renewable energy technology, utilizing the flow of water to generate electricity through an internal impeller rotation mechanism. This feature further enhances the device’s sustainability by allowing it to operate without relying on external power sources. The combination of a simple trash collection mechanism and renewable energy use makes the Eco Blue Bin a truly innovative approach to marine waste management. In this study, the focus is to perform a computational fluid dynamic (CFD) simulation study on the design of blades rotator to investigate the flow velocity, swirl flow pattern, pressure and the swirl effect. An Ansys fluent software R18.2 student version is used to analyse the fluid dynamics of the rotator. The results will determine the best rotator that will be used at the real prototype. Hence, the Eco Blue Bin prototype is modelled in Ansys Fluent to study the swirl flow effect by using two (2) types of rotator design that is round blade and six-blades shaped rotator. Two different rotator designs were modelled and tested: a round blade design and a six-blade shaped rotator. The results of the CFD analysis revealed significant differences between the two designs. The six-blade shaped rotator outperformed the round blade design in terms of pressure distribution, producing higher maximum pressure and negative pressure, which are crucial for capturing waste more efficiently. Additionally, the six-blade rotator generated a more effective swirl flow velocity, creating streamlined flow patterns that were more effective at pulling debris into the Eco Blue Bin. Although the velocity value does not differ much for the two types rotator but the flow streamlines of six-blades shaped rotator does show 2-3 wakes extra created to show a high swirl flow effect. The negative pressure increases by 266% and the maximum pressure increases by 593 % when compared the rotation of 20 rad/s between round and six-blades shaped rotator. This design of the six-blades shaped rotator was found to be superior in both the waste collection process and the generation of renewable energy, making it the optimal choice for use in the final prototype.