Chemical Engineering & Technology

Typical examples at Bayer Technology Services demonstrate the capability of continuous-flow production processes with micro-structured equipment in different production scales. The elaborated know-how is commercially used in a franchise between BTS, INVITE, Ehrfeld Mikrotechik BTS, and further partners in the product Flonamic^®.

Gas-permeable membrane-based reactors offer safe handling of gases in a continuous-flow system. A prototype of a gas/liquid system was constructed to introduce gas in a microreactor. An integrated gas flow controller and inline FTIR analysis were used to safely handle the gas. Carboxylation of a Grignard reagent with CO₂ served as a nonhazardous model reaction.

Micro process engineering has initiated a rethinking in process design within the field of chemical process engineering. In order to demonstrate how these changes in process design influence the use of life cycle assessment (LCA), the available literature on LCA in early R&D for conventional chemical and micro reaction engineering is reviewed.

The combination of microreactor technology and CFD is used to gain process understanding of the diffusional properties of the substrate and product of a biocatalytic reaction. Such knowledge is then applied to design reactor configurations. It has been demonstrated that this kind of knowledge is crucial for the choice and design of reactors.

For deposition of catalyst coatings in microchannels by wash-coating, a novel low-cost screen printing procedure was developed which is suited for mass production. Rheological properties and adherence of catalyst suspensions were optimized, allowing the successful implementation of screen printing without impairing the catalytic performance.