Classification of Reactions and Reaction Kinetics

Many batch reactors deal with constant-density reaction systems. This includes most liquid-phase reactions as well as all gas phase reactions occuring in a constant-volume bomb. This is a constant volume batch reactor and is the focus of this chapter. Much of this chapter is derived from Levenspiel[24]. 

In a constant volume system the measure of reaction rate (kinetics) for 

The reaction kinetics or rate of reaction can be described based on concentration of reactants A, B,C. ..) as below. 

The rate constant in a chemical reaction k consists of two parts as given below 

This temperature dependency is exploited in optimal control problems of batch reactor where optimal temperature profile is obtained by either maximizing conversion, yield, profit, or minimizing batch time for the reaction. One of the earliest works on optimal control of batch reactor was presented by Denbigh[25] where he maximized the yield. The review paper by Srinivasan et al.[26] describes various optimization and optimal control problems in batch processing and provides examples of semi-batch and fed-batch reactor optimal control. 

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