PREDICTION OF GAS HOLD-UP IN A COMBINED LOOP AIR LIFT FLUIDIZED BED REACTOR USING NEWTONIAN AND NON-NEWTONIAN LIQUIDS

• Main Authors: Sivakumar Venkatachalam, Akilamudhan Palaniappan, Senthilkumar Kandasamy, Kannan Kandasamy
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Association of the Chemical Engineers of Serbia 2011-09-01
• Series: Chemical Industry and Chemical Engineering Quarterly
• Subjects: combined loop airlift fluidized bed reactor; gas hold-up; Newtonian liquids; non-Newtonian liquids
• Online Access: http://www.ache.org.rs/CICEQ/2011/No3/CICEQ_Vol17_%20No3_pp375-383_Jul-Sep_2011.pdf

Many experiments have been conducted to study the hydrodynamic characteristics of column reactors and loop reactors. In this present work, a novel combined loop airlift fluidized bed reactor was developed to study the effect of superficial gas and liquid velocities, particle diameter, fluid properties on gas holdup by using Newtonian and non-Newtonian liquids. Compressed air was used as gas phase. Water, 5% n-butanol, various concentrations of glycerol (60 and 80%) were used as Newtonian liquids, and different concentrations of carboxy methyl cellulose aqueous solutions (0.25, 0.6 and 1.0%) were used as non-Newtonian liquids. Different sizes of spheres, Bearl saddles and Raschig rings were used as solid phases. From the experimental results, it was found that the increase in superficial gas velocity increases the gas holdup, but it decreases with increase in superficial liquid velocity and viscosity of liquids. Based on the experimental results a correlation was developed to predict the gas hold-up for Newtonian and non-Newtonian liquids for a wide range of operating conditions at a homogeneous flow regime where the superficial gas velocity is approximately less than 5 cm/s