• experimental
• rotating packed bed
• RPB
• theoretical

Since its introduction the Rotating Packed Bed (RPB) technology has become part of the area of interest of process intensification (PI). The process intensification deals with all the technologic innovations that permit an improvement in terms of efficiency, sustainability and environmental management [1]. The innovations are meant in terms of new equipment and processing methods which can bring benefits in the process industry. Industries are always looking for technologies that permit them to reduce the investment and operational cost and at simultaneously maintaining the same level of productivity and product quality or even improve them. The operational costs are not only those related to energetic consumes but also include the cost of the raw material and the cost of the treatment of disposal. For the industries to remain competitive, all the costs have to be minimized and at the same time the highest possible return has to be achieved.
For long time the capability of the RPB technology have not been understood and still now there is a lot of skepticism. The reasons for this skepticism are probably due to the not yet good knowledge of the physical phenomena that occurs during the operation. Moreover, the RPBs use the centrifugal acceleration to promote the mass transfer but, to do that, electricity is required. Therefore, the consumption of electricity is necessary to put the device in rotation but it results in another cost item. Anyway, the device has all the potentiality to become a relevant unit operation for the chemical industry in the future. In fact the RPBs with their high gravity technology (HiGee) permit to reduce the size of the equipment intensifying the mass transfer exchange because of the centrifugal acceleration. Compared with the conventional trays or packings columns for distillation and absorption the RPBs are also more flexible because the rotational speed can be adjusted to respond in very short time to changing of the feed composition or new product specification. To respond at the demand of a developed process industry definite answers on the equipment performances in the application fields are therefore required.
The aim of this thesis is to investigate the hydrodynamic and the mass transfer of Rotating Packed Bed devices (RPB) in particular trying to improve the latter acting on the design of its individual parts. Because of what said above, this investigation is a screening of all the process parameters looking for the more relevant factors that can influence a good or bad operating performance. Therefore, a good operating area is looked for.