A Dynamic Model for Glucose Fermentation in a Three-Phase Bioreactor

In this study the performance of an special three-phase bioreactor for biological production of ethanol and hydrogen was modeled using computational fluid dynamics. The effect of different Hydraulic Retention Time (HRT) of 1, 2 and 4 hr and Glucose mass fraction in feed of 0.002, 0.004, 0.006, and 0.008 on Hydrogen and ethanol production rate was determined. The maximum value of H2 production rate at the HRT of equal to 2h and Glucose mass fraction of 0.008 is 0.033 kg/h. It was demonstrated that the model is capable of predicting the variation of the EGSB reactor performance for biohydrogen and bioethanol production at various substrate concentrations and HRT values.