CFD Simulation of Phthalic Anhydride Reactor Performance in Farabi Petrochemical Company

In this paper, multitube reactor with a fixed bed catalyst to produce Phthalic anhydric using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has been studied. Therefore, based on the reaction kinetics,phthalic anhydride conversion and temperature changes during reactor length have been modeled in FEMLAB softwareby applying the appropriate boundary conditions. The CFD simulation results show good agreement with operationdata in Farabi petrochemical companyfor conversion to the desired product as well as the formation of hot spot locations along the reactor. Phthalic anhydride conversion rate and temperature distribution along the reactor for different operating parameters such as feed flow rate, feed concentration, inlet temperature and wall temperature has been studied. The results show that the hot spot due to high rate of reaction has been located nearby the entrance of reactor. Salt bath temperature is an important factor in the operation of o-xylene oxidation reactor. So that, even 1ºC increasing in salt bath temperature, create higher reaction rate, result in enhancement in o-xylene conversion.