Study of holdup and slip velocity in an L-shaped pulsed sieve-plate extraction column

Authors

• Elham Mohammadi ¹
• Jafar Towfighi ¹
• Jaber Safdari * ²
• Mohammad H. Mallah ²

1. Chemical Engineering Department, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box: 14115‑143, Tehran, Iran
2. Materials and Nuclear Fuel Research School, Nuclear Science and Technology Research Institute, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

High-end applications require a very tall vertical extraction column in some cases which deteriorates protection against radiation and cannot be employed for indoor applications. On the other hand, horizontal extraction columns offer higher efficiency and pretension, but lower maximum throughput. In order to address this issue, the L-shaped pulsed extraction column is a new type of extractors which were recently introduced for such applications with area constraints. The objective of this study is to evaluate the effects of operating parameters and physical properties on the variation of holdup and slip velocity in this type of extractors for three liquid systems including toluene–water, butyl acetate–water and n butanol–water without and under mass transfer condition. A comprehensive investigation on the determination of predictive ability of available correlations for the holdup and slip velocity in pulsed plate columns has been conducted. Finally, new correlations are proposed for prediction of these parameters regarding operational conditions and physical properties.

Keywords

• Holdup
• L
• Mass transfer
• Pulsation intensity
• Shaped pulsed plate column
• Slip velocity