Effects of Partition Wall within Packings on Separative Performances of Water Distillation for H₂O-HTO Isotope Separation

Abstract

For the performance assessment of H₂O-HTO isotope separation by distillation, three-dimensional internal vapor flow and concentration profiles were obtained numerically for two types of packing of 6 mm of inner diameter and 6 mm of height: One is a simple cylindrical tube (packing I) and the other diametrically partitioned with an internal wall (packing II). The results of the concentration profiles were used to estimate separative performances of the packings. The total mass transfer rate of HTO from vapor to liquid per unit area of vapor-liquid interface per unit vapor flow rate decreased with an increase in the vapor flow rate, and the value for the packing II is smaller than that for the packing I in the range of relatively small vapor flow rate. Each separative power for the packing I and II has a maximum value of 1.4×10^–7 g/s at the Reynolds number of the vapor Re_v of 54 and 3.7×10^–7 g/s at Re_v =160, respectively.

KEYWORDS:

• hydrogen isotope separation
• water distillation
• packed column
• packing
• vapor flow
• flow analysis
• separative analysis
• mole-fraction profile
• mass transfer
• separative power
• vapor-liquid interface