CFD Simulation of Water Gas Shift Membrane Reactor--Pressure Effects on the Performance of the Reactor

Membrane reactor is a process intensified equipment that carries out both the reaction and separation in a single vessel. The equilibrium limited water gas shift reaction is an ideal reaction to be carried out in a membrane reactor as it improves the conversion of the reaction and reduces the space requirement for the reactor. Computational fluid dynamics offers a virtual prototyping of the reactor and helps in design, optimization, and scale-up of the reactor. To obtain pure hydrogen from the membrane reactor, the pressure of the reactor needs to be optimized. Hence the water gas shift membrane reactor is subjected to computational fluid dynamic analysis to understand the role played by pressure on the performance of the reactor using three different gas mixtures. The CO conversion and H2 recovery for the different operating pressures are simulated and the effects of pressure are discussed in this paper.