Toward enhancement of rotating packed bed (RPB) reactor for CaCO3 nanoparticle synthesis

Intensification of CaCO3 nanoparticle production process through RPB is investigated in this work. More controllability attainment for a process is one of the objectives in the process intensification. Therefore, the study of the affecting factors on quality and quantity of the produced nanoparticles is very important. The suitable device was designed and manufactured for CO2 and Ca(OH)(2) reaction and crystallization in the nanoparticle form. The effect of packing type, rotating speed, gas and liquid flowrates was studied on the reaction time, the precipitation amount and the particle size in the liquid phase, according to the analysis of experiments designed based on the standard method. The results showed that the obtained particles in the system equipped with the Saddle type packing have smaller size compared to the system equipped with Pall type one. A theoretical model has been proposed to estimate the intermediate species, supersaturation, induction time and theoretical precipitation amount. The model implies that pH 11.4 is the best condition to have higher product rate. In addition, a new residence time distribution model for the recycled systems is proposed and experimentally evaluated for the setup.