Safe and Productive Operation of Homogeneous Semibatch Reactors Involving Autocatalytic Reactions with Arbitrary Reaction Order

Abstract

In this work a procedure for easily selecting safe and productive operating conditions of homogeneous semibatch reactors in which exothermic autocatalytic reactions are performed is developed and presented. Such a procedure is based on the boundary and temperature diagram method previously proposed in the literature for nonautocatalytic reactions. In the autocatalytic case an additional parameter appears in the mathematical model of the reactor as well as in the safety criterion, that is, the initial catalyst amount which is directly related to the coreactant accumulation in the system. A number of diagrams for identifying inherently safe operating conditions is provided, together with some rules of thumb for their use, allowing for easily selecting safe and productive operating conditions of homogeneous semibatch reactors in which exothermic reactions with autocatalytic behavior occur.