J. M. LOPES
F. LEMOS
F. RAMOA RIBEIRO
Instituto Superior Tecnico, Departamento de Engenharia Quimica, Av. Rovisco Pais, 1096 Lisboa

This paper presents a laboratory illustration concerning the problem of chemical reactor performance prediction. Real-world reactor flow patterns rarely conform to the ideal cases of plug flow or perfect mixed flow, and the equation describing the latter will not be applicable. If it should be necessary to predict the performance of a reactor, without a complete physical description of the inner workings of the reactor itself, a different approach to that supplied by mass balances will be required. The experiment described in this paper involves the determination of the residence time distribution function of a given real reaction system, and the use of this information to predict the outlet reactant concentration. The limiting approaches of complete segregation and perfect micromixing are discussed and analysed. The results are compared to the corresponding experimental values of reactant concentrations, and the influence of the extent of micromixing is evaluated.