Characterizing Heat Transfer Performance in a Slurry Bubble Column Reactor Equipped with a Real Heat Exchanger

Abstract

This study examines the impact of equipping a real heat exchanger in a slurry bubble column SBC on instantaneous and local heat transfer coefficients IHTC and LHTC, as well as the overall heat transfer coefficient U, employing advanced heat transfer techniques. The experiments were conducted in a 0.15 m inner diameter Plexiglas SBC with varying gas flowrates Ug (0.14–0.35) m/s at several radial sites along the column’s diameter (±0.18, ±0.46, and ± 0.74) and three axial locations (H/D = 2, 3 and 4). To simulate the industrial Fischer–Tropsch bubble column reactor FT-BCR, a real heat exchanger consisting of 18 copper tubes, each with a diameter of 0.16 m, were vertically installed, occupying 25% of the column cross-sectional. Glass beads with an average size of 150 μm were used loading up to 40% volume to represent the solid phase. The results demonstrated that both, LIHTC and U, showed significant decreases with increasing gas flow rates at all radial and axial positions. Moreover, the LIHTC near the wall notably decreased compared to the central zone by about 82% at the radial location and about 74% at the axial location. The obtained results and data contribute to understanding the impact of vertical tubes on heat transfer in a slurry bubble column reactor SBCR. Furthermore, the data obtained can validate reactor models, computational fluid dynamics CFD programs, and simulations, thereby improving the design and scale-up of these reactors.