CHEMICAL REACTION

ENGINEERING
Types of Reactors and Conductivity Meter

Submitted by: M. Mustafa

Registration no. 2017-CH-427
Submitted to: Engr Imran

University of Engineering and Technology Lahore, (Fsd) campus

1. Table of Contents
Chemical Reactor and its types ..................................................................................2
1.1. Introduction: ...................................................................................................3
1.2. Basic principle: ...............................................................................................3
1.3. Types of Reactors: ..........................................................................................3
Usage Examples...................................................................................................4
1.4. Semi batch reactor ..........................................................................................6
General Information.............................................................................................6
Application...........................................................................................................7
Advantages...........................................................................................................7
Disadvantages ......................................................................................................7
Concentration Measurement and dilution control .............................................10
Total dissolved solids - in natural waters ..........................................................11
Selective Chemical Measurement In mixed solutions ......................................11
Neutralization indicator .....................................................................................11
Leak Detection, single point or differential .......................................................11
1.5. References.....................................................................................................12

1|Page
Table Of Figure
Figure 1: Continuous stirred tank reactor ................................................. 3
Figure 2:Packed bed Reactor..................................................................... 4
Figure 3:Tubular Reactor .......................................................................... 5
Figure 4 :fixed bed Reactor ....................................................................... 6
Figure 5:Conductivity meter ..................................................................... 8
Figure 6:Handheld Conductivity Meter .................................................... 9
Figure 7:Laboratory Conductivity Meter ................................................ 10

2|Page
 Chemical Reactor and its types

Introduction:
 Reactor is the heart of Chemical Process.
 A vessel designed to contain chemical reactions is called a reactor.
 An industrial reactor is a complex chemical device in which heat transfer, mass transfer, diffusion
and friction may occur along with chemical with the provisions of safety and controls.

Basic principle:
All chemical processes are centred in a chemical reactor. The design of a chemical reactor Is the
most important factor in determining the overall process economics.

Types of Reactors:
There are following different types of reactors:
1. Continuous stirred tank reactor
2. Fixed bed reactor
3. Tabular reactor
4. Moving bed reactor.
5. Fluidized bed reactor

Continuous stirred tank reactor

The continuous flow stirred-tank reactor (CSTR), also known as vat- or back mix reactor, is a
common ideal reactor type in chemical engineering. A CSTR often refers to a model used to estimate the
key unit operation variables when using a continuous agitated-tank reactor to reach a specified output.
The behaviour of a CSTR is often approximated or modelled by that of a Continuous Ideally Stirred-
Tank Reactor (CISTR). All calculations performed with CISTRs assume perfect mixing. In a perfectly
mixed reactor, the output composition is identical to composition of the material inside the reactor, which
is a function of residence time and rate of reaction.

Figure 1: Continuous stirred tank reactor

3|Page
 If the residence time is 5-10 times the mixing time, this approximation is valid for engineering
purposes. The CISTR model is often used to simplify engineering calculations and can be used to describe
research reactors. In practice it can only be approached, in industrial size reactors.
In a continuous-flow stirred-tank reactor (CSTR), reactants and products are continuously added
and withdrawn. In practice, mechanical or hydraulic agitation is required to achieve uniform composition
and temperature, a choice strongly influenced by process considerations. The CSTR is the idealized
opposite of the well-stirred batch and tubular plug flow reactors. Analysis of selected combinations of
these reactor types can be useful in quantitatively evaluating more complex gas-, liquid-, and solid-flow
behaviours

Usage Examples
Continuous stirred-tank reactors are most commonly used in industrial processing, primarily in
homogeneous liquid-phase flow reactions, where constant agitation is required. They may be used by
themselves, in series, or in a battery. CSTRs are also used in the pharmaceutical industry as a loop reacto

Packed Bed Reactors

Packed bed reactors can be used in chemical reaction. These reactors are tubular and are filled with solid
catalyst particles, most often used to catalyze gas reactions. The chemical reaction takes place on the surface
of the catalyst. The advantage of using a packed bed reactor is the higher conversion per weight of catalyst
than other catalytic reactors. The conversion is based on the amount of the solid catalyst rather than the
volume of the reactor.

Figure 2:Packed bed Reactor

Applications:
i. In industry, a packed column is a type of packed bed used to perform separation processes, such
as absorption, stripping, and distillation.
ii. A packed column is a pressure vessel that has a packed section. Columns used in certain types
of chromatography consisting of a tube filled with packing material can also be called packed

4|Page
 columns and their structure has similarities to packed beds. The column can be filled with random
dumped packing (creating a random packed column) or with structured packing sections, which are
arranged or stacked (creating a stacked packed column).
iii. In the column, liquids tend to wet the surface of the packing and the vapors pass across this wetted
surface, where mass transfer takes place. Packing material can be used instead of trays to improve
separation in distillation columns.
iv. Packing offers the advantage of a lower pressure drop across the column (when compared to plates
or trays), which is beneficial while operating under vacuum.
v. Differently shaped packing materials have different surface areas and void space between the
packing. Both of these factors affect packing performance.

Tubular reactor or plug flow reactor

Tubular reactor is a vessel through which flow is continuous, usually at steady state, and
configured so that conversion of the chemicals and other dependent variables are functions of position
within the reactor rather than of time. In the ideal tubular reactor, the fluids flow as if they were solid plugs
or pistons, and reaction time is the same for all flowing material at any given tube cross section. Tubular
reactors resemble batch reactors in providing initially high driving forces, which diminish as the reactions
progress down the tubes.
Flow in tubular reactors can be laminar, as with viscous fluids in small-diameter tubes, and
greatly deviate from ideal plug-flow behaviour, or turbulent, as with gases. Turbulent flow generally is
preferred to laminar flow, because mixing and heat transfer are improved. For slow reactions and especially
in small laboratory and pilot-plant reactors, establishing turbulent flow can result in inconveniently long
reactors or may require unacceptably high feed rates.

Figure 3:Tubular Reactor

Tubular reactors are always used in a continuous flow mode with reagents flowing in and products
being removed. They can be the simplest of all reactor designs. Tubular reactors are often referred to by a
variety of names:

 Pipe reactors
 Packed-bed reactors

5|Page
  Trickle-bed reactors
 Bubble-column reactors
 Emulating-bed reactors

Applications:
i. Tubular reactors are used in a variety of industries such as Petroleum, Petrochemical, Polymer.
Pharmaceutical, Waste Treatment, Specialty Chemical, Alternative Energy.
ii. Tubular reactors are used in a variety of applications such a Carbonylation, Dehydrogenation,
Hydrogenation, Hydrocracking, Oxidative decomposition, Partial oxidation, Polymerization,
Reforming.

Fixed bed reactors:

A heterogeneous catalyst is used frequently in industry where gases flow through a solid catalyst (which
is often in the form of small pellets to increase the surface area). It is often described as a fixed bed of
catalyst (Figure 5).
Among the examples of their use are the manufacture of sulfuric acid (the Contact Process, with
vanadium(V) oxide as catalyst), the manufacure of nitric acid and the manufacture of ammonia (the
Haber Process, with iron as the catalyst).

Figure 4 :fixed bed Reactor

Semi batch reactor

Semi-batch reactors lie between batch and continuous reactors in terms of operation. Pictured below is a
vertical reactor that can be configured to operate in semi-batch mode.

General Information

6|Page
Semi-batch reactors occupy a middle ground between batch and continuous reactors. They are open systems
like CSTRs and run on an unsteady-state basis like batch reactors. They usually consist of a single stirred
tank, similar to a batch reactor.

Application
Semi-batch reactors are not used as often as other reactor types. However, they can be used for many two-
phase (i.e. solid/liquid) reactions. Also, semi-batch reactors are used when a reaction has many unwanted
side reactions, or has a high heat of reaction. By limiting the introduction of reactants, potential problems
are eliminated.

Advantages

 Good temperature control

 Unwanted side-reactions minimized

Disadvantages

 High labor cost per unit product

 Large scale production difficult to achieve
 Reactor operations difficult to analyze

Fluidized Bed Reactor

A fluidized bed reactor (FBR) is a type of reactor device that can be used to carry out a variety
of multiphase chemical reactions. In this type of reactor, a fluid (gas or liquid) is passed through a
solid granular material (usually a catalyst possibly shaped as tiny spheres) at high enough velocities to
suspend the solid and cause it to behave as though it were a fluid. This process, known as fluidization,
imparts many important advantages to the FBR. As a result, the fluidized bed reactor is now used in many
industrial applications.

Basic principles:
The solid substrate (the catalytic material upon which chemical species react) material in the fluidized bed
reactor is typically supported by a porous plate, known as a distributor. The fluid is then forced through the
distributor up through the solid material. At lower fluid velocities, the solids remain in place as the fluid
passes through the voids in the material. This is known as a packed bed reactor. As the fluid velocity is
increased, the reactor will reach a stage where the force of the fluid on the solids is enough to balance the
weight of the solid material. This stage is known as incipient fluidization and occurs at this minimum
fluidization velocity. Once this minimum velocity is surpassed, the contents of the reactor bed begin to
expand and swirl around much like an agitated tank or boiling pot of water. The reactor is now a fluidized
bed. Depending on the operating conditions and properties of solid phase various flow regimes can be
observed in this reactor.

Advantages:
i. The increase in fluidized bed reactor use in today's industrial world is largely due to the inherent
advantages of the technology.
ii. Uniform Particle Mixing: Due to the intrinsic fluid-like behavior of the solid material, fluidized
beds do not experience poor mixing as in packed beds. This complete mixing allows for a uniform

7|Page
 product that can often be hard to achieve in other reactor designs. The elimination of radial and
axial concentration gradients also allows for better fluid-solid contact, which is essential for
reaction efficiency and quality.
iii. Uniform Temperature Gradients: Many chemical reactions require the addition or removal of heat.
Local hot or cold spots within the reaction bed, often a problem in packed beds, are avoided in a
fluidized situation such as an FBR. In other reactor types, these local temperature differences,
especially hotspots, can result in product degradation. Thus FBRs are well suited
to exothermic reactions. Researchers have also learned that the bed-to-surface heat
transfer coefficients for FBRs are high.
iv. Ability to Operate Reactor in Continuous State: The fluidized bed nature of these reactors allows
for the ability to continuously withdraw product and introduce new reactants into the reaction
vessel. Operating at a continuous process state allows manufacturers to produce their various
products more efficiently due to the removal of startup conditions in batch processes.

Disadvantages:
i. As in any design, the fluidized bed reactor does have it draw-backs, which any reactor designer
must take into consideration.
ii. Increased Reactor Vessel Size: Because of the expansion of the bed materials in the reactor, a larger
vessel is often required than that for a packed bed reactor. This larger vessel means that more must
be spent on initial capital costs.
iii. Pumping Requirements and Pressure Drop: The requirement for the fluid to suspend the solid
material necessitates that a higher fluid velocity is attained in the reactor. In order to achieve this,
more pumping power and thus higher energy costs are needed. In addition, the pressure
drop associated with deep beds also requires additional pumping power.
iv. Erosion of Internal Components: The fluid-like behavior of the fine solid particles within the bed
eventually results in the wear of the reactor vessel. This can require expensive maintenance and
upkeep for the reaction vessel and pipe.

Conductivity meter:
An electrical conductivity meter (EC meter) measures the electrical conductivity in a solution. It has
multiple applications in research and engineering, with common usage in hydroponics, aquaculture,
aquaponics, and freshwater systems to monitor the amount of nutrients, salts or impurities in the water.

Figure 5:Conductivity meter

8|Page
Types of Conductivity Meter
The general types of conductivity meter are given below:
1. Handheld Conductivity Meter
2. Portable Conductivity Meter
3. Laboratory Conductivity Meter
4.

Handheld Conductivity Meter

Universal conductivity meters with large multifunction display for measurement of conductivity
temperature, salinity and total dissolved solids. With the proven dirt-insensitive 4-electrode system they
offer the highest degree of precision and operating comfort.

Features:
 Handy
 Dust- and waterproof
 Easy to use
 GLP-conform
 Low-power system allows continuous operation for upto 2500 h
 Long usability

Figure 6:Handheld Conductivity Meter

Portable Conductivity Meter

They convince because of their high degree of operator comfort and foolproof operator guidance via the
large multifunctional display. They are equipped with a carrying/support handle and carrying strap as
standard.

9|Page
Features:
 Shockproof
 Waterproof
 Portable
 Reliable
 Standard conductivity measurement and conductivity measurement at depths down to

Laboratory Conductivity Meter

Routine laboratory conductivity meter with large multifunctional display, parallel temperature display and
automatic temperature compensation. 20 °C or 25 °C can be set as reference temperature. Both TDS and
salinity measurements are possible as well as conductivity and temperature. The ability to set different cell
constants means that other special conductivity cells can be connected as well as the 325 4-electrode
conductivity cell and LR 325/01 ultrapure water conductivity cell.

Features:
 Performance-oriented instrument range
 Simplified Operator convenience
 Mains independent
 Suitable as bench and wall-mounted models
 Country-specific units
 ISO-conform documentation
 Application-oriented displays

Figure 7:Laboratory Conductivity Meter

Application of Conductivity Meter:

Concentration Measurement and dilution control
This is the simplest and one of the most widely used applications. Conductivity meter readings are
correlated with charts, graphs or previous lab readings to obtain quite accurate and instantaneous values of

10 | P a g e
chemical concentration. In some instances where there is widespread demand for the measurement, special
non-linear direct reading meter scales are available. This is true for applications involving the dilution of
NaOH, H2SO4 and HCI, among others.
Total dissolved solids - in natural waters
The various salts and minerals dissolved in natural waters are reasonably uniform in their contribution
to conductivity at the concentrations normally encountered. This means that a reading of electrical
conductivity meter can be used as an indicator of the total amount of dissolved material in solution. For
water taken from a single source, this relationship is quite repeatable and accurate and provides a
means of controlling the upper allowable solids limit in industrial heating and cooling systems utilizing
re-circulating water. The water is re-circulated for reasons of economy, but if evaporation losses allow
solids levels to rise too high, scaling and precipitation of various salts will occur. Conductivity control of
the system bleed valve thus allows the user to achieve maximum economy while preventing equipment
damage. Cooling towers and boilers are common applications for the measurement, but it may also find
use in swimming pools, fountains and other closed water systems.

Selective Chemical Measurement In mixed solutions

Soluble materials can vary radically in their effect on conductivity. A solution containing 2% acetic acid
has a conductivity of slightly less than 1000 ohms. Obviously, acetic acid would not prove to be a serious
interference to the measurement of HCI concentration if they were both in solution. Just as obviously, acetic
acid concentration could not be measured at all in the presence of an equal (or much lesser) amount of
hydrochloric. Even if the HCI were constant, too much resolution is required to see the effect of the acetic.

The example is somewhat extreme, and most chemicals are more similar in their conductivities than this.
But in many cases, a chemical of interest can be detected in the presence of several other solutes if: (a) the
interferences are at relatively constant levels or (b) the chemical of interest possesses a much higher
conductivity than other components. Thus NaOH concentrations can be detected in a mix of NaCI and
NaOH (if the NaCI does not vary radically) because NaOH is several times.

Most acids and bases are considerably more conductive than their salts because of the tremendous mobilities
of hydrogen and hydroxyl ions.

An indication of the feasibility of measuring a particular chemical in solution with others can be gained by
consulting charts. Conductivities are not directly additive, but they approach this condition closely enough
to allow a rough estimate of the conductivity of a mixed solution to be obtained from the sum of the
individual conductivities of its components. Barring a chemical reaction between constituents, conductivity
of the mix will be somewhat less than the sum of the separate values. In dilute solutions it will be only
slightly less. In strong solutions it may drop considerably. This is because increasing concentration in most
cases lowers ionic mobilities.
Neutralization indicator
As previously mentioned, H+ and OH- ions provide a greater increase in conductivity than equal amounts
of any other ions. This leads to an interesting and little used property of the measurement (seldom used for
industrial control, but it is a common lab technique), that of a titration or neutralization end-point detector
Leak Detection, single point or differential
A single conductivity meter measurement at a point of interest can be used to detect spills or leaks if they
can be expected to provide a significant and unusual change in conductivity. Thus, a probe in a plant effluent
channel that normally runs at 10,000 umhos could easily detect a rather small amount of HCI-but it might

11 | P a g e
not see acetic acid at all.

In situations where the conductivity of the contaminant is smaller than normal steam fluctuations caused
by other factors, a differential measurement with a conductivity sensor can be used. One measurement is
taken at a point prior to the location of potential leaks or spills- such as the inlet.

A second is taken downstream from where contaminant is expected to be introduced-in this case, the outlet
of the heat exchanger. The readings are then electrically compared. If they rise and fall together, no action
is taken. But, should the outlet rise significantly higher than the inlet, it will indicate that tube penetration
has occurred and the cooling stream is being contaminated within the exchanger. The conductivity meter
can trigger alarms or actuators to alert an operator or shutdown the system automatically.

Two excellent single point applications are the monitoring of boiler return condensate for process
contamination and measurement to determine the quality of high purity water (distillation, reverse osmosis,
etc.).

References

1. ^ Pereira, Carmo J.; Leib, Tiberiu M. (2008). "Section 19, Reactors". Perry's Chemical
Engineer's Handbook (8th ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
p. 4. ISBN 9780071542265. OCLC 191805887.
2. ^ Prud'homme, Roger (2010-07-15). Flows of Reactive Fluids. Springer Science+Business
Media. p. 109. ISBN 9780817646592.
3. ^ Schmidt, Lanny D. (1998). The Engineering of Chemical Reactions. New York: Oxford
University Press. ISBN 0195105885.
4. ^ Levenspiel, Octave (January 1993). The Chemical Reactor Omnibook. Oregon St Univ
Bookstores. ISBN 0882461605.
5. ^ Suresh, S.; Sundaramoorthy, S. (2014-12-18). Green Chemical Engineering: An Introduction
to Catalysis, Kinetics, and Chemical Processes. CRC Press. p. 67. ISBN 9781466558854.
2. McPherson Lori. "How Good Are Your Values for Total Dissolved Solids." Chemical Engineering
Progress 91 (1995): 58-59. Print.

12 | P a g e