Abstract
This work aims to investigate the mass transfer behaviour of a gas sparged rotating cylinder electrochemical reactor suitable for conducting diffusion-controlled liquid-solid and gas-liquid-solid reactions. Variables studied were: cylinder rotation speed, N-2 superficial velocity and the effect of sodium lauryl sulphate surface-active agent concentration. Gas sparging enhanced the rate of mass transfer by a factor ranging from 1.1 to 2.67. Addition of sodium lauryl sulphate reduced the rate of mass transfer by an amount ranging from 2.7 to 27%. The effect of specific power consumption (is an element of) on the mass transfer coefficient of un-sparged rotating cylinder was found to agree fairly with the well-known Calderbank - Moo-Young equation. The performance of the gas sparged rotating cylinder was expressed in terms of the criterion kA/is an element of. The value of kA/is an element of was found to increase with decreasing gas superficial velocity and cylinder rotation speed. Possible applications of the present study for designing electrochemical reactors suitable for conducting diffusion limited reactions such as production of H2O2, flue gas desulphurization and air pollution control were highlighted. The possible use of the present reactor as a catalytic reactor for conducting diffusion controlled biochemical reactions catalyzed by immobilized enzyme or cell was noted.