Performance study and comparison between catalytic static mixer and packed bed in heterogeneous hydrogenation of vinyl acetate

Abstract

Catalytic Static Mixers (CSMs) used in a continuous flow reactor for heterogeneous catalysis have been compared with packed bed reactor technology for the hydrogenation of vinyl acetate to ethyl acetate over 5 wt-% Pd/Al2O3 catalyst. The CSM reactor showed lower pressure drop, better heat transfer, and higher conversion and turnover frequency compared to a traditional packed bed reactor. A reaction performance study with varying CSM length has been performed and shows that the hydrogenation reactions are limited by the chemical reaction kinetics and not by the mass transfer.