Abstract:
The purpose of this work is to study the chemical absorption of carbon dioxide in bubble column reactor with the presence of plastic media. Firstly, the effect of media shape and concentration on mass transfer and bubble hydrodynamic parameters was determined. Secondly, the rate of carbon dioxide absorption was observed in varied concentration of sodium carbonate solution. Finally, the combination of chemical reaction and plastic media was conducted in bubble column reactor. The results show the media with high bed porosity like the ring media can increase absorption rate. A large number of media can obstruct bubble coalescence and trap bubbles longer in the absorption process, especially for large bubbles. For chemical reaction, the absorption rate drops with high concentration of the carbonate solution due to the low solubility of carbon dioxide which decreases with ionic strength. As the results in this study, the 1%w of sodium carbonate solution is the optimum and more efficient with the addition of rate-promoter. The plastic media tends to slightly enhance the carbon dioxide absorption rate in bubble column reactor from 0.2630 mg/L.s to 0.2649 mg/L.s. Overall, the carbon dioxide absorption processes in bubble column reactor in this study are the intermediate-rate reaction which provide the Hatta number around 0.88 0.93.