Simulação em CFP de um reator CSTR para produção de biodiesel.

Abstract

This work proposes a mathematical model to a reactor of CSTR-type (Continuous Stirred-tank reactor) starting from experimental data of the kinetics of transesterification of soybean oil and methyl acetate, with the catalyst enzyme, Candida Antarctica. A reactor volume was proposed for the average residence time of the reaction mixture was sufficient such that the expected yield, based on data obtained by Matlab, was obtained in the reactor outlet. The reaction fluid dynamic study was done using the commercial software ANSYS® version 15.0. The optimization of the reactor was proposed by comparing the reactor operation with two impellers separately in order to make the process more homogeneous as possible, trying to achieve the perfect blend of reactor configurations. The impellers used were the type inclined straight blades and Ribbon RIPO (Anchor), to determine which of the impellers can the satisfactory performance with lower power operation. The required power was determined by the equations for mechanical mixers, being rated only as a variable rotation of the blades