Design Concept of a Sieve Plate Distributor for Liquid-Liquid Extraction - Part 1: Laboratory-Scale Experiments and Design

摘要

Liquid-liquid exraction is the most important thermal separation process next to distillation. The surface required for mass transfer is generated by dispersing one liquid in form of drops into a second liquid which is immischible with the first one. As apparatus mainly countercurrent columns with rotating or static internals and mixer settler units are used. In sieve plate columns, the dispersed phase is redistributed over the columns section at every tray. By contrast, columns with random or structured packings have only a small capability of self-distribution for the dispersed phase. For a high separation performance and thus a low column height, an evendistribution of the dispersed phase over the column cross section is necessary in addition to an optimal drop size.