Technique on Synthesis of Alcohol Ether Fuel in Slurry Bubble Column Reactors (I)—Experimental Study on Bubble Behavior

Abstract

Slurry bubble column reactors are finding increasing application in emerging technologies for synthesis of alcohol ether fuel. Slurry bubble column reactor is a three-phase fluidized reactor with outstanding advantages compared with other reactors in heat transfer, interphase mass transfer rates, and temperature control. Although relatively simple in construction, slurry bubble columns are difficult to scale-up due to lack of information on hydrodynamics and mass transfer over a wide range of operating conditions of commercial interest. In this article, the experiment was conducted to investigate the bubble behavior. Local measurement is integrated with global measurement in this system.

Keywords:

• four-channel conductivity probe
• hydrodynamics
• slurry bubble column reactor

Acknowledgment

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support by National Basic Research Program of China (973 program) (No. 2005CB221205) and by Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (PCSIRT) (IRT0620).