Dr Farid Aiouache

 

TEACHING

CHE4014 and CHE8008 Energy and Quality Management,  Lecturer and Module coordinator
CHE8017 and CHE4018 Advanced Oil & Gas Process  Lecturer and Module coordinator
CHE1002 Chemical Eng. Principles 1, Lecturer and Module coordinator
CHE3013 and CHE3014 Design Project  Supervisor
CHE2011 Process Control Level 2, Lecturer and Module coordinator
CHE2009 Chemical engineering thermodynamics, Lecturer and module coordinator, 2006-2007, 2007-2008 and 2008-2009
CHE4007and CHE 8008 Advanced Chemical Engineering, Lecturer
CHE2005 Chemical Engineering Laboratory  Lecturer and Module coordinator
CHE4012 Industrial projects Project Supervisor
CHE 8018 Research project Supervisor

 

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

Member of the Institute of Chemical Engineers (IChemE)-Catalysis and particle technology groups
Member of American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE)
Member of Society of Chemical Engineers of Japan
Referee for journals such as Chemical Engineering Science, Industrial Chemical Engineering Research, Fluid Phase Equilibria, Journal of Chemical Engineering of Japan, catalysis today, applied catalysis-A and B, Chemical engineering journal.

 

RESEARCH

 

Research interest

Catalyst design and reaction engineering by spatial spectroscopy

Innovative multifunctional reactors

 

Current research projects

1. Catalyst and reaction engineering by spatial spectroscopy

1.1. Visualization of local temperature and concentration inside packed bed reactors by near-infrared tomography

Conventional development strategies in which the catalyst is developed independently of reactor design have shown their limitations in providing a detailed solution at various scale levels of the reactor design. There is a need to carry out catalyst and reactor development simultaneously and improve the integration of catalytic chemistry and reaction engineering. The aim of this project is to develop research strategies to investigate heterogeneous gas-solid catalytic reactors based on spatiotemporal information. Gas-solid heterogeneous systems use packed beds in chemical technology such as reactors, separators, dryers or filters and energy generation technology such as combustion, fuel cells or energy storage. The design of packed beds by a detailed knowledge of local data in terms of composition, temperature and fluid dynamics is of upmost importance as suggested by recent developments of computer fluid dynamics. Experimental validations, however, are still not sufficiently mature. This project looks by diffuse near-infrared tomography at local concentration and temperature distributions inside packed bed reactors/adsorbers/difusers, where water vapour and its isotopers are used as tracer examples owing to their highly spectral absorptions in near-infrared. Flow maldistribution and uneven maps of temperature and composition in the core packed bed have been clearly observed which allow fine-tuning of local heat uptake/resource and cross-mixing profiles that were partly anticipated by CFD simulations.

 

 

 

1.2. Visualization of local temperature and concentration inside packed bed reactors by two-dimensional cavity-enhanced absorption near-infrared tomography

The project aims to extend the application of near-infrared diffuse transmittance tomography to probing common gases such as CO, CO₂ and NO_x which are known to exhibit low absorptions compared with that of water vapour. The dedicated design is expected to promote the two dimensional optical paths making NIR diffuse tomography sensitive to any local chemical changes, mass & heat transport and flow dynamics inside reactors/adsorbers/fuel cells.

 

1.3. Local catalyst deactivation

The fundamentals of local deactivation by structural changes or surface blockages have been extensively investigated at molecular scale causing particle breakage and inhibition of reaction rates whilst the process of deactivation is still not sufficiently understood at higher scale, particularly the interaction of catalyst deactivation with fluid flow, mass & heat transports and initial bed structures. This project aims at carrying out experimental work by in-situ quadupole mass-spectrometry and 2D/3D CFD simulations to examine the interactions between packing structure, gas flow and reaction/deactivation and predict various maps of heat sink/resource, local hot/cold spots, uneven mixing and caking that would cause reactor tube failure.

 

1.4. Packed beds for energy storage

The design of packed beds is increasingly cited for the storage of thermal energy from solar air heaters whilst is still based on averaged axial/radial data of temperature, velocity and pressure drops. This project aims at using near-infrared diffuse transmittance tomography to predict local efficiency of thermal storage along with flow dynamics and various bed structures.

 

1.5. Spatial (3D) visualization of water vapour and temperature in a PEM Fuel Cell by near-infrared tomography

This project aims to use near-infrared imaging is used to probe two-dimensional water distribution in a proton-exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell. A tuneable diode near-infrared laser is collimated at different angles around a dedicated membrane and intercepted by a focal planar detector. Preliminary experiments show that local water generation on catalyst surface relied on the interactions of the catalytic process with the gas flow, the temperature and  the extend of humidification.

2. Innovative multifunctional reactors

2.1 Ionic liquid enhanced reactive distillation

This project aims to synthesise fuel additive such as ether oxygenates by using ionic liquids with a dual role as entrainer and catalyst in a homogeneous reactive distillation column. The process is environmentally friendly as reaction the conventional organic solvent n-pentanes is replaced by ionic liquids. In addition, the difficulty of catalyst separation encountered in homogeneous reactive distillations is limited as the ionic liquid is easily purified by a simple decantation or flash distillation. The etherification of tert-butyl alcohol with ethanol for ether fuel additives is investigated. Ionic liquid was found a good entrainer for ethyl-tert-butyl ether as shown by the residue curve maps of the reactive species. The project, therefore, investigates the effect of chemical kinetics and thermodynamic properties   of reaction mixture in the ionic liquids on and their effects on the distillation efficiency.

 

2.2. Enhancing biomass gasification properties using embedded waste water derived catalysts

This work introduces an innovative method to improve combustion performance by coating biomass pellets with inorganic of sodium silicates and waste sludges prepared by the sol-gel techniques thereby creating catalytically enhanced biomass pellets. The physical properties such as compression strength, stability, density, porosity, humidity content and biological degradation of the developed pellets were investigated as a function of their formulation and the energetic properties were investigated by TPO and gasification tests. The catalytic properties of the binding films in the pellets are giving promising results as they were able to degrade the problematic tars, increased hydrogen production and avoided potential fouling in the packed bed.

 

 

2.3. Mechanisms and chemical kinetics of biomass conversion to liquid and gaseous fuels

Increasing environmental concerns about carbon dioxide production coupled with increase in oil prices are turning the bio-refinery option to be attractive as a viable route for renewable energy production.  The bio-refinery concept is similar to the concept of a petroleum refinery as it integrates a variety of processing techniques to covert a range of biomass feeds of complex mixtures into a variety of fuels, power, heat, and value-added chemicals.  This project aims to establish practical kinetics models of biomass conversion into liquid and gas fuels including that engineers can use under a wide range of operating conditions. The biomass-conversion includes steps of hydrolysis to sugars, dehydration to polyols, aldol condensation and hydrogenation to liquid fuels or reforming to hydrogen fuels. The kinetic models achieved  provide a promising option to produce, under controlled operating conditions, the desired route towards  hydrogen, light or heavy oxygenates and alkanes products from biomass-derived oxygenates.