Predicting the Efficiency of Corrugated Sheet Structured Packings with Large Specific Surface Area

Ž. Olujić, M. Behrens, L. Colli and A. Paglianti

Abstract
A thorough evaluation of the predictive accuracy of the Delft model has indicated that the predicted mass transfer efficiencies for vacuum and atmospheric conditions are too optimistic for packings with large specific surface areas, particularly those with a corrugation angle of 60 degrees. This occurred mainly due to an over-prediction of the effective interfacial area. To arrive at more conservative predictions in effective area, a well-known correlation for random packings was adapted to structured packing geometry. However this proved to be insufficient, and an additional correction factor expression was included to account explicitly for observed surface area and corrugation angle related effect. This resulted in a satisfactory accuracy over the whole range of packings and process conditions considered. Most importantly, with this addition the Delft model does not require any adjustable, packing specific parameter, and can be used to indicate optimal packing configuration for specific application needs

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Keywords
Effective area, structured packings, mass transfer efficiency, distillation