Synthol CFB reactors

One discouraging problem is the decrease in reactor or combustor performance when a pilot plant is scaled up to a larger commercial plant. These problems can be related to poor gas flow patterns, undesirable solid mixing patterns and physical operating problems (Matsen, 1985). In the synthol CFB reactors constructed in South Africa, first scale-up from the pilot plant increased the gas throughput by a factor of 500. Shingles and McDonald (1988) describe the severe problems initially encountered and their resolution. 

Shingles, T., and McDonald, A. F., Commercial Experience with Synthol CFB Reactors, in Circulating Fluidized Bed Technol. II, (P. Basu, and B. P. Large, eds.), Peigamon Press, Oxford (1988)... 

History and operational experience of Synthol CFB reactors Catalyst developments and comparison of fixed fluid bed and CFB Methanol synthesis Methanol-to-olefins... 

Shingles T, McDonald AF. Commercial experience with synthol CFB reactors. In Basu P, Large BP, eds. Circulating Fluidized Bed Technology I. Oxford Pergamen Press, 1988. 

Typical equipment Sasol Synthol CFB Sasol Advanced Synthol (SAS) Sasol Arge Shell Middle Distillate Synthesis (SMDS) Sasol Slurry Bed Reactor (SSBR) Exxon mobile demonstration Conoco demonstration... 

FFB Reactors. The two 5-m i.d. FT reactors in the Brownsville, Texas, plant were FFB units. They, initially, were plagued by low conversion attributed to poor catalyst fluidization. These problems were apparently overcome, but the plant was shut down in the mid 1950s. It took more than 30 years before this type of reactor was again used commercially. Improved versions of the FFB reactors were developed by Sasol R D (see the section The Order of Development of FT Reactors at Sasol R D ) and installed at the Secunda plant. Over the period 1995-1999, 16 second-generation CFB reactors were replaced by 8 FFB reactors, 4 of 8-m i.d. with capacities of 0.47 Mt per year each and 4 of 10.7-m i.d. each with a capacity of 0.85 Mt per year. This increased the Secunda plant s capacity from about 5.1 Mt to about 7.5 Mt per year. These units were named SAS (Sasol Advanced Synthol) reactors. 

Steynberg. A. P., Shingles, T., Dry, M. E., and Yukawa, Y., and Sasol, X. X. Commercial Scale Experience with Synthol FFB and CFB Catalytic Fischer-Tropsch Reactors, in Circulating Fluidized Bed Technology III (Basu, P Horio, M., and Hasatani, M., eds.), pp. 527-532. Pergamon Press, Oxford (1991). 

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