Heat Transfer Performance Studies of Packed Bed Distillation Setup

Abstract

Heat transfer performance studies done in a setup involving a stirred tank reactor and packed bed distillation column. Stirred tank reactor consists of double pitch blade impeller with rotational speeds varied from 40-120 rpm. The water-air system was taken into consideration. The reactor is jacketed with Therminol 55 as a heating medium. Therminol 55 is used as a heating medium because of its higher specific heat and boiling point. Column comprises of 3 packed bed segments, each of 1m in height and jacketed with Therminol 55. Therminol 55 is used as a source of indirect heating to negate any heat losses in the column. The column is randomly packed with Mellapak250Y packing. The data collected by experiments especially characterizes the packed bed distillation setup and heat transfer performance. The work evaluates effect of agitation on overall heat transfer coefficient and mass flow/ boil up rate calculated theoretically and experimentally. Use of efficient correlations along with various necessary dimensionless numbers and rudimentary parameters were clubbed to form a MATLAB model useful for verification of theoretical data. The comparison of theoretical and experimental overall heat transfer coefficient and mass flow/boil up rate is done. The study done on the setup used shows conclusions regarding overall heat transfer coefficient and mass flow/boil up rate with respect to agitator speed and Reynolds number. The theoretical calculated values of overall heat transfer coefficient and mass flow/boil up rate are compared with the experimental ones and conclusions taken out regarding the reactor and column contribution. Finally, the Reynolds number and mass flow/boil up rate relation is shown