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Local Hydrodynamics Investigation of Industrial Scaled-Down Upflow Moving-Bed Hydrotreater Reactor using a Two-Tip Optical Probe
Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering
  • Vineet Alexander
  • Hamza Albazzaz
  • Muthanna H. Al-Dahhan, Missouri University of Science and Technology
Abstract

Upflow moving-bed hydrotreater (MBR) is used in refineries as a guard reactor to a fixed-bed residual desulfurization reactor. Uniform local flow distribution in these reactors is critical to avoid issues like coking, catalyst agglomeration, and hotspots in the catalyst bed. Local maldistribution is investigated on a scaled-down MBR at a scaled-down industrial flow condition using an experimental technique called two-tip optical probe (TTOP), which gives local phase saturations, phase velocities, backmixing, and maldistribution at voids of a two-phase-flow packed bed. TTOP implemented at local radial/axial locations indicates highly fluctuating phase saturations inside the catalyst bed, with zones having low-to-high gas or liquid saturations, indicating severe local maldistribution. The local phase backmixing and local maldistribution is more on the upper part of the bed.

Department(s)
Chemical and Biochemical Engineering
Research Center/Lab(s)
Center for High Performance Computing Research
Keywords and Phrases
  • local hydrodynamics,
  • maldistribution,
  • moving-bed reactor,
  • two-tip optical probe
Document Type
Article - Journal
Document Version
Citation
File Type
text
Language(s)
English
Rights
© 2021 Canadian Society for Chemical Engineering, All rights reserved.
Publication Date
1-1-2020
Publication Date
01 Jan 2020
Disciplines
Citation Information
Vineet Alexander, Hamza Albazzaz and Muthanna H. Al-Dahhan. "Local Hydrodynamics Investigation of Industrial Scaled-Down Upflow Moving-Bed Hydrotreater Reactor using a Two-Tip Optical Probe" Canadian Journal of Chemical Engineering (2020) ISSN: 0008-4034; 1939-019X
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/muthanna-al-dahhan/140/