Dynamic modeling of preferential CO oxidation in monolithic catalytic reactor using Pt–Fe/γ-Al2O3 catalyst

Abstract

This study presents the dynamic modeling of preferential CO oxidation (CO-PROX) over a Pt–Fe/γ-Al2O3 catalyst in a monolithic reactor under both adiabatic and isothermal conditions. The modeling allowed us to investigate the effects of disturbance of the inlet conditions on transient performance. This work includes a mathematical description of the heat- and mass-transfer of species with a quasi-2D approach and a global kinetic mechanism. The model was validated by simulating the steady-state operation of the CO-PROX isothermal reactor and comparison of the predictions with experimental data obtained between 363 and 553 K at atmospheric pressure. The CO-PROX reactor model proved to be robust and accurate in the high-temperature regime (>410 K) and can be used for real-time simulation. The high response sensitivity of the adiabatic reactor predicted a significant improvement in CO conversion at temperatures from 435 K with the addition of a small amount of energy while maintaining a response time of 15 s. The isothermal reactor exhibited a reasonably fast response time when exposed to a realistic gas hourly space velocity scheme based on transient fuel demand in a proton exchange membrane fuel cell system.