Liquid hold­up measurement in Mellapak Plus 752Y packed bed using X­ray tomography

S. Aferkaa, A. Vivaa, E. Brunazzib, M. Crinea, D. Toyea, J. Abdullah, P. Marchota

a Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, University of Liège, Sart­Tilman, B6, B4000 Liège, Belgium

b Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Pisa, 56100 Pisa, Italy

c Nuklearmalaysia, Bangi, 43000 Kajan, Selangor, Malaysia

ABSTRACT

This work focuses on the use of X­ray tomography in investigating the flow distribution in a structured packed bed. Cross sections of the liquid hold up distribution in a 10 cm diameter column packed with Mellapak Plus 752Y are obtained at various column heights for different liquid and gas flow rates. Differing from our previous investigations, local values but also global values at the bed scale are obtained allowing a direct comparison with published results and correlations resulting from conventional techniques. The agreement at the bed scale is very good.

Keywords X­ray tomography, Multiphase reactors, Packed bed, Hydrodynamics, Liquid hold­up distribution