A fully optimized electrowinning cell for achieving a uniform current distribution at electrodes utilizing sampling-based sensitivity approach

Abstract

In this paper, a zinc electrowinning cell is fully optimized to achieve a uniform current distribution at electrode surfaces. To effectively deal with an electromagnetically coupled problem with multi-dimensional design variables, a sampling-based sensitivity approach is combined with a highly tuned multiphysics simulation model. The model involves the interrelation between electrochemical reactions and electromagnetic phenomena so as to predict accurate current distributions in the electrowinning cell. In the sampling-based sensitivity approach, Kriging-based surrogate models are generated in a local window, and accordingly their sensitivity values are extracted. Such unique design strategy facilitates optimizing very complicated multiphysics and multi-dimensional design problems. Finally, ten design variables deciding the electrolytic cell structure are optimized, and then the uniformity of current distribution in the optimized cell is examined through the comparison with existing cell designs.