Study on flow patterns in different types of direct coal liquefaction reactors

Hot mold flow patterns in bubble reactor, ebullated reactor and loop reactor have been researched and compared in hydrogen–oil system and hydrogen–oil coal slurry system of direct coal liquefaction (DCL) pilot plant under high temperature and high pressure. The results demonstrate that the ebullated reactor and loop reactor (on the condition of optimum recycle ratio) show good performance of back-mixing, which can not only reduce temperature differences between top and bottom in the reactor, but also avoid big solid particles deposition that easily occurs during liquefaction process. The ebullated reactor used in the first demonstration plant has good performance. Copyright © 2009 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.