Mathematical Modelling of Rheological Properties of Low-density Polyethylene Produced in High-Pressure Tubular Reactors

DIETRICH, MAIRA L.; BRANDOLIN, ADRIANA; SARMORIA, CLAUDIA; ASTEASUAIN, MARIANO

Venecia

Simposio; 16th IFAC Symposium on Advanced Control of Chemical Processes ADCHEM 2021; 2021

International Federation of Automatic Control

Low-density polyethylene (LDPE) is a commodity polymer widely used in a variety ofapplications. Due to the complexity of its molecular structure, which includes molecular weight distributionand randomly distributed long-chain branching, its rheological behavior is varied. In the present work, amathematical model is used to predict molecular and rheological properties of LDPE produced in a highpressuretubular reactor under different operating conditions. The agreement between flow curvepredictions and experimental data is very good, demonstrating the potential of this model as a predictivetool for industrial producers.