Simulation of Polypropylene Production Loop Reactor

The Spheripol process is one of the most widely used technologies in the world for the production of polypropylene (PP). The geometry of the reactor is such that the use of ideal reactors alone causes an error in the simulation results. Therefore, in this research, we have tried to combine the ideal reactors modules in Aspen Plus. v11 to get the most accurate results. In order to calculate the volume of the ideal reactor, we used the concept of «required length for fully developed flow» and considered the inlets, outlet, and pump of the reactor as a continuously stirred tank reactor (CSTR) while the other part of the reactor considered as plug flow reactor (PFR). We also used three different kinetic constants reported by three different research groups and compared the result with the production plant data. Due to the importance of the thermodynamic model for the prediction of phase behavior, we used the Perturbed Chain Statistical Associating Fluid Theory (PC-SAFT) equation of state that was used by previous authors. The results are validated with the production plant data and previous articles. Also, the effect of methanol as a catalyst poison is investigated.