Modeling and simulation of high-pressure industrial autoclave polyethylene reactor

Abstract

Abstract. High-pressure technology for polyethylene production has been widely used by industries around the world. A good model for the reactor fluid dynamics is essential to set the operating conditions of an autoclave reactor. The high-pressure autoclave reactor model developed in this work was based on a non-isothermal dynamic model, where PID control equations are used to maintain the operation at the unstable steady state. The kinetic mechanism to describe the polymerization rate and molecular weight averages are presented. The model is capable of computing temperature, concentration gradients and polymer characteristics. The model was validated for an existing industrial reactor and data for production of homopolymer polyethylene and has represented well the behavior of the autoclave reactor used in ethylene homopolymerization.