The study of heat transfer phenomenon in porous media by fluids percolated in the axial direction has been of interest to many researchers in various branches of science and technology. Applications are directed to different process such as filtration, distillation, absorption and adsorption in columns, drying and catalytic reactions in fixed beds. The literature has presented several solutions of the heat diffusion / convection equation in fixed bed reactors, but these studies are limited to a cylindrical geometry. In this sense, this work aim to present a pseudo-homogeneous three-dimensional model to describe the steady-state heat transfer within a fixed bed reactor with elliptic cylindrical geometry by considering variable porosity. The energy equation written in elliptical cylindrical coordinates and applied to the porous medium (particulate system) is discretized numerically using the finite volume method. Results of the temperature distribution within the bed are presented analyzed. It was verified that with increased porosity heat transfer inside the reactor tends to be more intense and thus, lower temperature gradients are found in all cross section of the reactor.
A three dimensional CFD simulation and optimization of direct DME synthesis in a fixed bed reactor