Reaction Engineering, Kinetics, and Catalysis

Design methodology for barrier-based two phase flow distributor

  1. Ma'moun Al-Rawashdeh1,
  2. Xander Nijhuis1,
  3. Evgeny V. Rebrov2,
  4. Volker Hessel3,
  5. Jaap C. Schouten3,*

Article first published online: 17 FEB 2012

DOI: 10.1002/aic.13750

Issue

AIChE Journal

AIChE Journal

Volume 58, Issue 11, pages 3482–3493, November 2012

Additional Information

How to Cite

Al-Rawashdeh, M., Nijhuis, X., Rebrov, E. V., Hessel, V. and Schouten, J. C. (2012), Design methodology for barrier-based two phase flow distributor. AIChE J., 58: 3482–3493. doi: 10.1002/aic.13750

Author Information

  1. 1

    Dept. of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Laboratory of Chemical Reactor Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands

  2. 2

    Reactor and Process Engineering, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Queen's University Belfast, BT9 5AG Belfast, UK

  3. 3

    Dept. of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Laboratory of Chemical Reactor Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands

*Dept. of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry, Laboratory of Chemical Reactor Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5600 MB Eindhoven, The Netherlands

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 5 OCT 2012
  2. Article first published online: 17 FEB 2012
  3. Accepted manuscript online: 24 JAN 2012 04:40PM EST
  4. Manuscript Revised: 3 JAN 2012
  5. Manuscript Received: 8 OCT 2011

Funded by

  • Dutch Technology Foundation (STW). Grant Number: 07979
  • Industrial Advisory Board (IROP)
  • Netherlands Research School in Process Technology (OSTP)
  • Micronit

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Keywords:

  • flow distribution;
  • microreactor;
  • numbering-up;
  • fabrication tolerance;
  • hydraulic resistance network

Abstract

The barrier-based distributor is a multiphase flow distributor for a multichannel microreactor which assures flow uniformity and prevents channeling between the two phases. For N number of reaction channels, the barrier-based distributor consists of a gas manifold, a liquid manifold, N barrier channels for the gas, N barrier channels for the liquid, and N mixers for mixing the phases before the reaction channels. The flow distribution is studied numerically using a method based on the hydraulic resistive networks (RN). The single phase hydraulic RN model (Commenge et al., 2002;48:345–358) is extended for two phases gas-liquid Taylor flow. For ReGL <30, the accuracy for the model was above 90%. The developed-model was used to study the effects of fabrication tolerance and barrier channel dimensions. A design methodology has been proposed as an algorithm to determine the required hydraulic resistance in the barrier channels and their dimensions. This methodology is demonstrated using a numerical example. © 2012 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2012

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