Optimization of the dehydration of glycerol to acrolein and a scale up in a pilot plant

The value of glycerol can be increased in the transformation to acrolein in the presence of a heterogeneous acidic catalyst. The aim of this project is the investigation of the reaction properties in means of conversion to acrolein. Complete glycerol conversion and high acrolein selectivity are the main targets. The reactions have been performed continuously in plug flow fix bed reactors. The engineering part of this project consists in the optimization of the reaction parameters. Thereby, the influence of different parameters such as temperature, glycerol concentration, feed flow of the glycerol solution and oxygen flow, is studied. The statistical program Design Expert helps in the optimization and process development. Furthermore, the design of a pilot plant was carry out for scale up studies. The temperature study in the catalytic bed was investigated and tested successfully. Some experiments about the oxidation of acrolein to acrylic acid were also conducted in this plant. General calculations were done in order to determine the optimal reaction conditions, such as the study of the possible existence of mass transfer limitations, the thermodynamic, phase diagrams and kinetic of the process. Finally, we obtained reactions conditions which demonstrate the feasibility of the commercialization of this process.

Grantor dc:publisher

Publikationsserver der RWTH Aachen University

Year dc:date

2007

Author dc:creator

• Sabater Prieto, Sergio

Contributors dc:contributor

• Hölderich, Wolfgang F.

• info:eu-repo/classification/ddc/660
• Glycerol
• Acrolein
• Technische Chemie

Statement dc:rights

• info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess

Language dc:language

eng

Identifier

https://publications.rwth-aachen.de/search?p=id:%22RWTH-CONV-112891%22

OAI record oai:identifier

https://publications.rwth-aachen.de/oai2d?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=oai_dc&identifier=oai%3Apublications.rwth-aachen.de%3A50342