Ideal flow models for palladium membrane reactors.

The effects of flow patterns on the dehydrogenation performance of palladium membrane reactors in which a sweep gas is used to remove the permeated hydrogen were examined. By combining two idealized flow patterns, plug and perfect mixing flows, to the reaction and separation streams, five flow models—cocurrent, countercurrent, plug-mixing, mixing-plug, and mixing-mixing models—were analyzed and compared.It was evident that the countercurrent model leads to the highest degree of conversion and the shortest reactor length requirement while the performance of the mixing-mixing model is the lowest, except when the flow rate of sweep gas chosen is comparatively small. The order of performance among the other three models was dependent on the variables used in calculations.