Reactors- “The Place where Catalyst lives”
A reactor and catalyst have intimate relationship like hand and glove. The design of catalyst must also consider the design of reactor and vice versa. Our theme of work is to synthesize various materials (catalysts) for industrially valuable pathways which are usually carried out in Fixed Bed reactors.
The advantages of Fixed Bed Reactor are:-
- Ideal Mixed Flow
- Simple Analysis
- Low Cost & Maintenance
- Little Cost
- Little wear on Catalyst & Equipment
- Great Variations in operating condition & contact time is possible
The conversion of short chain alkanes namely ethane, propane and butane (a by-product of petroleum processing and present in natural gas) to olefins ethylene, propylene, the butenes, and butadiene respectively has a great value due to the increased demand of the products formed. the direct conversion of ethane and propane to commodity chemical intermediates has the potential to radically transform the chemical industry
We investigate various materials for Oxidative Dehydrogenation of alkanes. The main advantage is the exothermic nature of the reaction which avoids the thermodynamic constraints of other non-oxidative routes by forming water as a byproduct. In addition to that we try to selectively oxidize alcohols to their respective carbonyl compounds in vapor phase.
In extending the study on fixed bed reactors and to understand the various pathways from renewable sources like biomass we study selective hydrogenation and hydrogenolysis for many platform chemicals to fine chemicals of commercial value. Also the testing and valorization of biomass sources for biodiesel applications is a part of our focus.