Phase equilibrium engineering of heterogeneous-catalyzed and non-catalytic supercritical reactions

S. PEREDA; S. BOTTINI; E.A. BRIGNOLE

Natal

Conferencia; II Iberoamercian Conference on Supercritical Fluids (PROSCIBA 2010); 2010

Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte

The use of supercritical fluids can greatly enhance the performance of reactions limited by the partial miscibility of reactants. In general, these reactions are diffusion-controlled and the use of supercritical fluids increases the reaction rate by eliminating the interface. In addition, better selectivities can be achieved at supercritical conditions due to the possibility of uncoupling process variables. Besides phase equilibria, volumetric properties play an important role in the design of continuous supercritical reactors, since the density of the reacting mixture determines the residence time in the reactor. Phase equilibrium engineering gives knowledge about process potentials and limitations through the application of thermodynamic tools in the development of general criteria to set the boundaries of process feasible operating regions. This work reviews different criteria for solvent selection, phase behavior control, and calculation of feasible operating region boundaries in heterogeneous-catalyzed and non-catalytic supercritical reactions