Effect of Artificially Provoked Marangoni Convection at a Gas/Liquid Interface on Absorption

Abstract

The effect of artificially provoked Marangoni convection on absorption of CO 2 by water was theoretically and experimentally investigated. The effectiveness of absorption enhancement by continuously dissolving aqueous binary mixtures of methanol, ethanol, and n -propanol at a water surface was studied. Although the mass-transfer coefficient values were underpredicted, the theoretical predictions were found to be qualitatively verified by the experimental results. The discrepancy was attributed to the inability of the theory to consider the effective interfacial area for the absorption process in the presence of induced turbulence. A dimensionless equation for correlating the experimental mass-transfer coefficient in the presence of interfacial turbulence was satisfactorily developed.