Influence of Liquid Properties and Design Parameters on Mass Transfer in Gas–Liquid Flow through a Miniaturized Reactor

• Published in: Industrial & engineering chemistry research Vol. 62; no. 20; pp. 8053 - 8062
• Main Authors: Denker, Jan-Niklas, Thelen, Tobias, Herbstritt, Frank, Heck, Joachim, Grünewald, Marcus, Biessey, Philip
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Chemical Society 24.05.2023
• Subjects: Thermodynamics, Transport, and Fluid Mechanics
• ISSN: 0888-5885; 1520-5045
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.2c04220

This paper presents the results of oxygen absorption from air in various liquid media within a rectangular milli-channel equipped with exchangeable staggered herringbone-like mixing inserts. We have determined the volumetric liquid-side mass transfer coefficient k L a using three different liquid substances (water, ethanol, and polypropylene glycol) in a range of superficial liquid velocities of 0.047–0.210 m s–1 and superficial gas velocities of 0.012–0.210 m s–1. From this data, we derived an empirical k L a-correlation. Overall, k L a values ranging from 0.036–0.515 s–1 were obtained, and the correlation predicts k L a with a coefficient of determination of R 2 = 0.93. We have also examined the influences of changing the static mixer design parameters on the mass transfer performance and evaluated the mixer efficiency by taking the power consumption into account. Depending on liquid properties, the right choice of a mixer design leads to a significant improvement in mass transfer and/or efficiency.