4.

0 Detail Design
POLYMATH
POLYMATH
5.0 Discussion and Conclusion

A tubular reactor where the feed is continuously introduced at one end and the products
continuously removed from the other end. The concentration / temperature in the reactor is not
uniform. They are usually used for gas-phase reactions requiring high temperatures. Used for both
exothermic and endothermic reactions, heat transfer is effective through the tube walls. Fluid going
through a plug flow reactor is modeled as flowing through the reactor as a series of infinitely thin
coherent “plugs”, each having a uniform composition. The plugs travel in the axial direction of
the reactor, with each plug having a different composition from the ones before and after it. In an
ideal plug flow reactor, it is assumed that there is no mixing of the medium along the long axis (X-
axis) of the reactor although there may be lateral mixing in the medium at any point along the long
axis (ie the Y-axis). PFR has a higher percentage in product completion. This is proven by the
graph that has been plotted where by it shows that conversion increases as volume increases. PFR
operates in a continuous flow and in a steady condition which allows the amount of product to be
produced higher. According to the graph of temperature against volume, temperature increases as
volume increases.

In a nutshell, PFR have a high volumetric unit conversion, run for long periods of
time without maintainable, and the heat transfer rate can be optimized by using thinner tubes or
fewer thicker tubes in parallel.
7.0 Safety Consideration in building the reactor

In building a chemical reactor it is important to be aware on the type of reaction that occur whether
it is endothermic or exothermic reaction. This is because thermal runaway usually happens in
exothermic reactor as the temperature rises from the heat of reaction being released then increasing
the reaction rate thus require special consideration in building it. The temperature needs to be in a
moderate or the optimum level as the higher the temperature then the higher is the heat of reaction
may be released. In a condition where the rates of the heat of reaction release are higher than the
heat removal than the personnel on site could not adjust to lower down the temperature or execute
emergency or shutdown procedure for the reactor as control is lost, then the temperature can rise
rapidly and the elevated temperature can initiate explosion or other hazardous runaway. Next, add
thermal control jacket to the reactor to increase the cooling of the reactor so the temperature for
the reactor could not increase to a higher extent which can lead to explosion. Next, build an
external cooling water sprays at atmospheric pressure to the reactor as it can cool the reactor.

Then, the pressure also needs to be in the optimum level as over-pressurization and higher
pressure drop is a big concern in the reactor as it can lead to explosion. There are many reasons
that can cause pressure to build up in the reactor such as runaway reaction or lack of product
flowrate. Next, creating a pressure relief system is an important and crucial part as it functions to
protect from a potential explosion. Finally, add interlocks to the reactor so the flow rate can be
control below the maximum level which will prevent the clogging of pipeline.
8.0 Ways to increase the conversion of ethylene oxide to ethylene glycol

There are many ways that can be utilized to increase the conversion of ethylene oxide to ethylene
glycol. First, we can increase the ethylene oxide concentration as the reactant concentration is
directly proportional to the rate of reaction for positive order reaction thus it will lead to higher
number of effective collisions per unit time in producing ethylene glycol. Second, decrease the
feed flow rate into an optimum level of residence time as it will be more efficient in converting
ethylene oxide into ethylene glycol and simply getting rid of incomplete conversion due to high
feed flow rate and higher production of undesired byproducts. Then, the temperature also can be
increased to a point where the maximum number of primary products are produced while the least
number of byproducts are produced. Next, by changing the non-catalytic process to catalytic
process by adding catalysts such as phosphorous-based catalyst it can help in reducing the number
of byproduct formation and increase the selectivity to over 99% compared to non-catalytic with
only 90%. The catalyst functions to lower the activation energy of the ethylene oxide thus
increasing the number of effective collisions which directly affect the rate of reaction in a positive
manner.
9.0 References

Fogler, H. S. (n.d.). ELEMENTS OF CHEMICAL REACTION ENGINEERING FIFTH EDITION.

PRENTICE HALL.
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de_reactor
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