Investigation of hydrodynamic Mixing time and mass transfer Coefficient in a split cylinder Reactor with impeller

Abstract

Split cylinder is a type of the internal loop Airlift reactor. It consists of a vessel which is separated into a riser and a down comer by placing the baffles. The baffles that split the vessel are called split cylinder reactor. It is mainly used in waste water treatment applications, bioprocessing and the Chemical processing Industries. The attractive features of split cylinder reactors are simple by design and Engineering with good solid - liquid and gas-liquid mass transfer characteristics with power consumption. newlineThe present work highlights a detailed analysis of the mixing characteristics in terms of mixing time, hydrodynamics (liquid circulation velocity and gas holdup) and mass transfer coefficient performed in the split cylinder Airlift reactor equipped with impeller. For this purpose, the reactor with diameter of 0.150 m, height of 1 m, the cross sectional area of riser to down comer section (Ad/Ar) of 1 and bottom clearances of 0.2 m were used. Newtonian (water) and Non- Newtonian (0.1 0.5% (w/v) of Carboxy Methyl Cellulose) fluids with different viscosities are used as the liquid phase. Compressed air is used as the gas phase which is introduced through circular shaped sparger configurations with the flow rate of 5 Lpm to 50 Lpm. newline