Liquid–liquid extraction with chemical reaction in a novel impinging‐jets reactor

The theory of mass transfer accompanied by chemical reaction for the pseudo‐first‐order heterogeneous liquid–liquid reactions was used to measure the effective interfacial area in a novel two‐impinging‐jets reactor (TIJR), which is characterized by a small reactor volume equipped with two simple nozzles directed toward each other. Aqueous and organic streams were jetted through the nozzles into rotating and stationary disks, resulting in a highly turbulent mixture of aqueous and organic phases. Experiments were also conducted on the physical extraction of n‐Butyl formate into distilled water to measure the overall volumetric mass‐transfer coefficients. Due to both the impinging process and high rate shear forces acting on the phases, the overall volumetric mass‐transfer coefficients and volumetric extraction rates obtained by the physical and chemical method, respectively, increased dramatically compared to those obtained by conventional reaction systems and an air‐driven two‐impinging‐streams reactor developed by the present author. The enhancing effect of impinging jets on the conversion of aqueous NaOH solution was tested by another nonimpinging‐jets reactor.