Selective catalytic reduction of NO in a reverse-flow reactor: Modelling and experimental validation

The abatement of nitrogen oxides produced in combustion processes and in the chemical industry requires efficient and reliable technologies capable of fulfilling strict environmental regulations. Selective catalytic reduction (SCR) with ammonia in fixed-bed (monolithic) reactors has stood out among other techniques in the last decades. In this work, the use of reverse-flow reactors, operated under the forced un-steady state generated by the periodic reversal of the flow direction, is studied for improving the SCR performance. This reactor can take advantage of ammonia adsorption in the catalyst to enhance concentration profiles in the reactor, increasing reaction rate, efficiency and reducing the emission of un-reacted ammonia. The process has been studied experimentally in a bench-scale device using a commercial monolithic catalyst. The optimum operating conditions, best ammonia feed configuration (side or central) and capacity of the reactor to deal with feed concentration disturbances is analysed. The experiments have also been used for validating a mathematical model of the reactor based on mass conservation equations, and the model has been used to design a full-size reverse-flow reactor able of operating at industrial conditions.