Research interests

Project background

My project revoles around the so called “dissolved gas reactor” concept in which gas – liquid mass transfer is decoupled from the reactive process by dissolving gas in a suitable solvent, thereby making it useful for multiphase processes involving gases which are limited by gas – liquid mass transfer. The objective of my research is to investigate the feasibility of the dissolved gas reactor concept in multiphase processses involving solids, and to understand the key process mechanisms involved. Three model processes are studied which are the following.

(i) : Liquid – gas process involving reaction of CO2 with CaCl2/NH4OH solution to from precipitated calcium carbonate

(ii): Liquid – solid – gas process involving the reaction solid calcium hydroxide dispersed in methanol with CO2

(iii): The overbasing process in which CO2 gas reacts with a multiphase mixture of xylene, alkylsalicylic acid, methanol and metal hydroxide powder.

The third model process forms nanofluids containing metal carbonate nanoparticles. These nanofluids are thought to have a high density which means that they can store a significant amount of energy per cubic metre. The potential application of metal carbonate nanofluids is investigated in this project.

Project objectives

The broad objectives of the project are the following

(i): To investigate what benefits does dissolving gas bring towards the operation of multiphase processes involving solids and the quality of the products formed.

(ii): To investigate the key process mechanisms involved using a range of analytical techniques such as X – ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) and to model and simulate them.

(iii): To investigate the utility of metal carbonate nanofluids as a thermal energy storage fluid used in conjunction with heat pumps for the specific purpose of household heating. This will be done with the aid of Aspen Plus simulations.

Qualifications

• MEng Chemical Engineering