Mass transfer and reaction rate in rotating solid foam reactors

Reactor configurations based on rotating solid foams for fast three-phase reactions are presented. Solid foams are used as catalyst support and stirrer to mix the gas and liquid phases and to create fine gas bubbles. Mass transfer data are presented for different solid foam stirrer configurations and are compared to a slurry reactor with a Rushton stirrer. The foam block stirrer shows a kGLaGL of 0.18 s-1, which is 60% higher than using a Rushton stirrer. With a value of 4.2x10-3 ms-1 the liquid-solid mass transfer coefficient is around 20% higher than for the Rushton stirrer with copper slurry particles