Liquid-phase RTD studies in a flotation column: an analysis between tanks-in-series and axial dispersion models

Abstract

The objective of the present study is to evaluate the fluid dynamics of a flotation column (2" in diameter and 6 m in height) based on gas hold-up measurements and, in particular, by applying the liquid-phase RTD (residence time distribution) technique. Additionally, a comparative study is performed between different methodologies used to determine RTD hydrodynamic parameters such as fitting of tanks-in-series and axial dispersion models to the experimental data.The evidence indicates that the axial dispersion and tanks-in-series models agreed well with the experimental data, with a slight advantage of the first model, in terms of obtaining the fluid dynamic parameters. It was proven that the axial dispersion model parameters (Pe or N d ) can be obtained with good precision (R 2 > 0.99) within the evaluated ranges from correlations that use the number of tanks in series (N) values estimated by the tanks-in-series model.