PBE-based Drop Dynamics Simulation in an Unbaffled Stirred Tank Reactor

Abstract

The population balance equation (PBE)-based model describes the distribution of drop size with respective to its size. In this work, 30% TBP was dispersed in 4N nitric acid solution by turbine impeller. Drop-size distributions were measured with a 630 nm laser-based particle size analyzer. For daughter drop density function, a normal distribution function was considered. For breakage rate, Voigt model of Chen et al. was used in the simulation [1]. For coalescence, model of Coulaloglou and Tavlarides was used [2]. The population balance equation was solved and simulation results were compared with experimental results. It was observed that the breakage model of Chen et al. could reproduce the experimental results with good accuracy [1]. In this paper, detailed results of these investigations would be presented.

Keywords: Solvent extraction, population balance, drop-size distribution, modeling, mass transfer

Cite this Article

Somasundaram S, Kumar S, Vijayakumar V. PBE-Based Drop Dynamics Simulation in an Unbaffled Stirred Tank Reactor. Journal of Nuclear Engineering and Technology. 2016; 6(1): 25–35p.