Interfacial kinetics of biphasic hydroformylation of 1-dodecene catalyzed by water-soluble rhodium complex by a combined numerical and experimental approach

A novel approach for determining interfacial kinetics by excluding the mass transfer effect accurately by numerical simulation of fluid flow and mass transfer in a chemical reactor is presented. In the presence of surfactant, the biphasic hydroformylation of 1-dodecene catalyzed by water-soluble rhodium, complex in a stirred autoclave under laminar-flow conditions with flat, horizontal gas-liquid and liquid-liquid interfaces was studied. The new approach in the present kinetic study features the numerical simulation of fluid flow and mass transfer to accurately account for the mass transfer resistance involved in chemical reactions. The laminar-flow structure generated by a simple circular disk impeller as well as the concentration distributions of all components in organic and aqueous phases were simulated by computational fluid dynamics and transport phenomena. In combination with experimental results for the biphasic hydroformylation of 1-dodecene under the same reaction conditions as used in the numerical simulations, the interfacial kinetics of the biphasic hydroformylation of 1-dodecene was determined.