(519c) Compact Heat Exchange Reactor in Alcohol Production From Biomass

Chart's compact heat exchange reactor has been used in various applications especially for highly exothermic or endothermic reactions. Alcohol production from syngas for utilization of biomass is one of good applications to demonstrate the excellent features from the reactor since the reaction is very exothermic. A prototype of reactor consists of multiple reaction and cooling layers which are alternatively arranged. Each reaction layer contains multiple mini-channels in mm scale. Catalysts provided by WRI are packed into those mini-channels. The tested reactor is made of stainless steel to meet the requirements of the reaction conditions, e.g. 320C at 20 bars. The researchers have been continuously running the reactor for several weeks. The results indicated that the compact heat exchange reactor provides unique features to improve the process efficiency and productivity.