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Assessment of the Dispersion of Glycerol in Dimethyl Carbonate in a Stirred Tank
journal contribution
posted on 2019-04-04, 00:00 authored by Halina Murasiewicz, Jesús EstebanGlycerol carbonate has gained attention
as a value-added product
from reacting glycerol and dimethyl carbonate. This work studies the
dispersion in nonreacting conditions of the two compounds under conditions
relevant to the production of glycerol carbonate. Images were acquired
to obtain droplet size distributions and Sauter mean diameters (d3,2), which increased with dispersed phase volume
fraction and viscosity, whereas the difference of interfacial tension
with changing conditions could be neglected as its value remained
very similar at all conditions. d3,2 was
correlated with available theoretical models based on the Weber number
and energy dissipation rate, and two further correlations were proposed
for high and moderate viscosities to describe the effect of viscosity,
concentration of dispersed phase, and hydrodynamic parameters. The
predicted value of d3,2 correlated well
with experimental data, with the accuracy of both correlations reaching
at least 93%.