Hydrodynamic investigation of industrial gas-phase polyethylene reactors of two different technologies

Document Type : Research Article

Authors

Center of Engineering and Multiscale Modeling of Fluid Flow (CEMF), Faculty of Chemical Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

The quality of the gas-solid contact and mixing of the solid particles have profound effects on polymerization reactions of polyethylene in fluidized bed reactors. Hydrodynamic behaviors of the fluidized beds that are used in Basell and Mitsui technologies have been investigated. For this purpose, a two-phase model with the kinetic theory of granular flow was used. The model was first comprehensively validated against experimental data and then this validated model was used for further analysis. Results showed that the quality of solid distribution enhances from the bottom to the top of the reactor and reaches its maximum at the top of the bed. In addition, it was shown that a higher fraction of gas passes through the emulsion phase (in contact with particles) in the Mitsui reactor compared to the Bassel reactor, which reflects a better gas-solid contact in the Mitsui reactor. Additionally, the time-averaged axial velocity of the solid particles at different heights showed that the particle motion intensity is higher in the Basell reactor. At a normalized height of 0.72, the axial velocity of the solid particles is approximately 2 m/s in the Basell reactor and 1 m/s in the Mitsui reactor. Based on the axial velocity parameter, it can be said that the quality of the solid particle mixing in the Bassel reactor is better that that in the Mitsui reactor.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Amirkabir Journal of Mechanical Engineering
Volume 56, Issue 4
In Progress
July 2024
Pages 3-3

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics