Forecasting Sauter mean droplet size and examining the range of droplet sizes in a Tenova liquid–liquid extraction column

Abstract

Abstract A new type of Tenova pulsed extraction column was introduced in 2017. It is the newest generation of pulsed columns. Due to the internal equipment of this column and the lack of moving parts and the simplicity and speed of repairs and maintenance, it has been the focus of researchers in recent years. No correlations for predicting the mean drop size and drop size distribution of the Tenova column have been reported. The Sauter mean drop diameter and drop size distribution are investigated for a Tenova pulsed column with a diameter and an active height of 7.4 and 73 cm, respectively. Three standard chemical systems of isobutyl acetate-water, isobutanol-water, and toluene-water have been used. The effects of pulse intensity, dispersed and continuous phase flow rates have been taken into account. In each experiment, 200–300 drops have been analyzed in a total of 10,000 drops. The investigation covered a spectrum of physical properties, notably surface tension (within a range of 1.75–36 mN/m). Operating conditions including pulse intensity (in the range of 0.2–2 cm/s) and the flow rate of continuous and dispersed phases (in the range of 8–30 L/h) have been investigated. Methods based on artificial intelligence (AI) such as multilayer perceptron neural networks and gene expression programming were combined with a dimensional analysis approach to provide a new approach to estimating the mean drop diameter (d32). Experimental results have been compared with the equations found by other researchers in similar columns. The variation of drop size distribution has also been experimentally obtained.Methods based on artificial intelligence (AI) such as multilayer perceptron neural networks and gene expression programming were combined with a dimensional analysis approach to provide a new approach to estimating the mean drop diameter (d32). Experimental results have been compared with the equations found by other researchers in similar columns. The variation of drop size distribution has also been experimentally obtained.