Studies using high temperature flow reactors

4 Studies using high temperature flow reactors 

In addition to the flame studies there have been several investigations of CO oxidation in other flow reactors. 

Very similar dependences of the rate on the reactant concentrations were obtained by Longwell and Weiss [421], Hottel et al. [384], Williams et al. [422] and Dryer and Glassman [455] using stirred flow reactors. Hottel et al. [384] found 

The mechanism of oxidation in all these systems containing hydrogen or water vapour will consist of the addition of reaction (xxiii), and to a lesser extent reactions (Ivii), (Ixxiii) and (Lxxv), to the hydrogen—oxygen mechanism. The experimental findings are in accord with the theoretical eqn. (111). 

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High-temperature flow-reactor studies [60,61] on benzene oxidation revealed a sequence of intermediates that followed the order phenol, cyclopentadiene, vinyl acetylene, butadiene, ethene, and acetylene. Since the sampling techniques used in these experiments could not distinguish unstable species, the intermediates could have been radicals that reacted to form a stable compound, most likely by hydrogen addition in the sampling probe. The relative time order of the maximum concentrations, while not the only criterion for establishing a mechanism, has been helpful in the modeling of many oxidation systems [4,13]. 

Three ideal reactors—the batch reactor, the plug-flow reactor and the perfectly stirred reactor—are mathematical approximations to corresponding laboratory reactors that are used regularly to study chemical kinetics (Section 13.3.2). The batch reactor (or static reactor) is particularly useful to characterize explosion limits [241] and kinetic behavior at temperatures below 1000 K (e.g., [304,351]), while stirred reactors (e.g., [151,249,296, 367,397]) and flow reactors (e.g., [233,442]) have proved highly valuable in the study of chemical kinetics at higher temperatures. 

Cooking extruders have been studied for the liquefaction of starch, but the high temperature inactivation of the enzymes in the extruder demands doses 5—10 times higher than under conditions in a jet cooker (69). For example, continuous nonpressure cooking of wheat for the production of ethanol is carried out at 85°C in two continuous stirred tank reactors (CSTR) connected in series plug-flow tube reactors may be included if only one CSTR is used (70). 

Catalytic tests in sc CO2 were run continuously in an oil heated flow reactor (200°C, 20 MPa) with supported precious metal fixed bed catalysts on activated carbon and polysiloxane (DELOXAN ). We also investigated immobilized metal complex fixed bed catalysts supported on DELOXAN . DELOXAN is used because of its unique chemical and physical properties (e. g. high pore volume and specific surface area in combination with a meso- and macro-pore-size distribution, which is especially attractive for catalytic reactions). The effects of reaction conditions (temperature, pressure, H2 flow, CO2 flow, LHSV) and catalyst design on reaction rates and selectivites were determined. Comparative studies were performed either continuously with precious metal fixed bed catalysts in a trickle bed reactor, or discontinuously in stirred tank reactors with powdered nickel on kieselguhr or precious metal on activated carbon catalysts. Reaction products were analyzed off-line with capillary gas chromatography. 

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