LAB# 06

Rate of Absorption in the column and in sump tank

Objective:
To determine rate of absorption of CO2 into water from analysis of liquid solutions flowing down
the absorption column.

Apparatus:
Gas Purification Unit.
Model: CT-3303-SW
This apparatus consists of:

• Sump Tank: The sump tank contains distilled water and an integrated heater in order to
desorb CO2.
• Flow Meter: to check the flows of air and gas.
• Water Pump: Transferring the water from the bottom up to the top of the packed column
• Display Unit: separate display and control unit shows the readings of flow rates and
pressures
• Absorption tower: Two columns: (1. Upper column 2. Lower column) Absorption tower
with rashing rings to provide contact time to gas and water.
• Heat exchanger: plate and frame heat exchanger to maintain the temperature of entering
gas and shell and tube heat exchanger to maintain the temperature of the entering water.
• Flow meter sensor/ concentration measurement probe
• CO2 Cylinder
• Air Inlet
• Air compressor
• Heater
• Presurre sensor

• Industrial Chiller
Experiment Requirements:
1. CO2 cylinder with an integrated regulator in order to provide the carbon dioxide to the
tower.
2. Air supply from the atmosphere.
3. Chilled Water with the help of industrial chiller.

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

Figure:

Fig 01: Gas Purification Unit

Parts:

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

 Fig 2: Absorption Tower Fig 3: Display Unit

Fig 04: Industrial Chiller

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

Sample:
• Water
• Carbon dioxide (CO2)

Chemical:
• 0.0277 molar of NaOH
• Phenolphthalein indicator

Theory:
An absorption tower is an industrial tower used to separate out components of a rising gas with
the use of a falling liquid to trap the gas. This equipment is used in a variety of settings for
purification, processing of materials, and other activities. The absorption tower usually needs to
be custom designed for a specific application to ensure efficient and smooth operation. Like other
components of a factory, it needs regular cleaning and maintenance to function properly and can
be subject to inspection by regulatory officials. Packed towers include packing, which comes in a
variety of forms and materials. It provides a surface where contact and absorption can occur. The
packing allows for an efficient absorption process because of the greater contact area. For
properly packed tower absorption, packing material needs enough room for the liquid to flow
through and not cause a pressure drop. At the same time, it must also allow for the proper
amount of contact between the liquid and gas.
The two types of packing designs are structured and random.
In an absorption tower, the gas is pumped in at the bottom of the tower. It, along with any
impurities it contains, begins to float to the top. As it moves toward the top, the aerosolized liquid
is sprayed into the tower. The droplets catch impurities in the gas and carry them to the bottom
of the tower for collection. Some towers can have multiple points where the liquid is sprayed out
to capture different impurities or maximize the amount of material trapped. The flow of fluid and
gas has to be carefully controlled, as does the temperature, as these factors can have an impact
on how much the water can absorb. If conditions in the tower or the factory change, adjustments
may need to be made to compensate. The packed tower, in which two fluids flowing in opposite
directions enable a chemical component to be transferred from one fluid phase to the other, occurs in
almost all chemical plants. The process may be gas absorption, distillation, solvent extraction or chemical
reaction. A knowledge of the characteristics of both fluid flow and of mass transfer in such towers is
necessary for both plant operators and designers. The Gas Absorption Apparatus has been designed to
allow these studies to be made, and the instrumentation and layout enables students to follow both the
hydrodynamic characteristics in the absence of mass transfer, and also, separately, to advise the
performance of the mass transfer process involved in gas absorption. The size of the equipment has been
chosen so that experiments may be completed in a typical laboratory class period, while at the same time
being capable of demonstrating full scale plant behavior. Considerable attention is directed towards
matters of safety which is of crucial importance in the process industries.

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

Gas absorption is a widely used unit operation in chemical engineering. The gas absorption unit
is a pilot plant scale unit designed to demonstrate the principles of gas absorption and for
students to investigate the principles of packed tower absorption processes and hydrodynamics
as well as provide practical training in the operation of a gas absorption plant. This absorption
column is designed to absorb carbon dioxide and CO2 from an air/CO2 mixture into water flowing
down the column.
Components of packed tower

• Tower body.
• Tower packings.
• Structured packings.
• Random packings.
• Demister pads.
Tower internals.

• Liquid distributor.
• Packing supporting grid.
• Packing hold-down grid.
• Liquid redistributor.
• Gas distributor.
Features of packed tower:
1. Large production capacity. The working principle of plate towers and packed tower is
different. The rising gas in the plate tower passes though the liquid layer to achieve mass
transfer. The open area on the tower plate is 7% to 10%. In the packed tower, the rising
gas and flowing down liquid contact and achieve the mass transfer. The open area of
tower packing is above 50% and the voidage is above 90%. So the production capacity of
packed tower is far more superior than the plate tower in the unit sectional area.
2. High separating efficiency. As we all know, most of the filtering operation in the tower is
under atmospheric pressure and vacuum pressure. In this condition, the filtering
efficiency of packed tower is much higher than the plate tower.
3. Low-pressure drop. The packed tower has higher voidage, so the pressure drop is lower
than the plate tower. In the normal condition, the pressure drop of plate tower is about
0.4–1.1 kPa per unit theoretical stage while the packed tower is about 0.01–0.27 kPa. The
low-pressure drop can not only save the operating cost, but also save energy. It is very
suitable for the heat-sensitive material separation.
4. Low liquid hold-up quantity. Liquid hold-up quantity refers to the liquid quantity on the
packing surface, internals and plates. The liquid hold-up quantity of packed tower is less
than 6% while the plate tower is higher to 8-12%. Though the higher liquid hold-up
quantity can ensure the stable structure of materials and towers, but it needs long

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

 operating hours, long operating periods and expensive operating costs, which is bad for
the distillation process.
5. High operation flexibility. Operation flexibility refers to the adaptation of the tower to
the load. In the packed tower, the operation flexibility is decided for the internal designs,
especially the liquid distributor. Each components including tower packings and tower
inters has high operation flexibility. So the operation flexibility can be adjusted according
to different applications. The operation flexibility of plate tower is limited by the liquid
flood, liquid entrainment and downcomer capacity.

Procedure:
Initially make sure that the apparatus is in working condition. Before starting the experiment
make sure that the chiller is working properly, and that CO2 cylinder is filled. Furthermore, it
should be ensured that the sump tank is filled with distilled or clean water. It was also ensured
that all the gas connections and water connections are fitted accordingly. First of all the main
breaker is turned ON from the display panel. Then main power is turned on along with air
compressor. The next step is to open the feed water pump, alongside the inlet valve of CO2 is also
opened. The air passing through the compressor and the gas coming from the cylinder are to be
mixed and then they are passed through the plate and frame heat exchanger. The water from
the sump tank is passed through the shell and tube heat exchanger in order to be chilled or cooled
because the rate of absorption in chilled water is higher than in heated water. The gas mixture is
to enter from the bottom of the column and chilled water is from the top of the column.
Now as the time passed by such that 10, 20, 30 mints take the samples from the sump tank and
sampling point across these times. The volume of a sample taken is 50ml. Now after taking the
sample put 2 to 3 drops of indicator in the samples (the indicator used here is Phenolphthalein).
The next step is to fill the two burettes with 0.0277 M of NaOH. Now titrate the sample with the
NaOH and note the readings. If red color appears it means, there was free carbon in the sample
and if pink color appears and persists for 30 sec it means there was absorbed CO2 in the sample.
After completing the experiment turn off the feed water pump and air compressor priorly closing
the valve of CO2. Then the heat exchangers and chiller were turned off and at the end, the main
power and then main breaker was turned off.

Result and Discussion:

Vb = volume from burette
Cdi = inside CO2 concentration corresponding to the condition of the top tower
Cdo = inside CO2 concentration in the sump tank
F1 = Water Flow rate 5 L/min
INLET FLOW OF DISSOLVED CO2:

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

 = F1 X Cdo
OUTLET FLOW OF DISSOLVED CO2:
= F1 X Cdo
𝑉𝑏 𝑋 0.0277𝑀
Cd =
𝑉𝑜𝑙𝑢𝑚𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑠𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒

Rate of Absorption:
N = (F1 X Cdi ) – (F1 X Cdo)

Time From the Sump Tank From Liquid Outlet Rate of

(min) Absorption
Vb Cdi Vb Cdo
(N) gmol/s

10 13.5 0.007479 10 0.00554 0.009695

20 11.3 0.062 13.5 0.007479 0.006395
30 8 0.0044 14 0.0077 2.739*10^-4
40 12 0.0066 17.5 0.0096 0.015

The main objective of this experiment was to observe the rate of absorption with respect to time.
It was observed that as time passed the rate of absorption decreased because the concentration
gradient was decreasing as time was increasing. Moreover, there was a little deviation in the last
reading because the heater was on in that reading in the sump tank and whenever the
temperature increases desorption occurs and that’s why there was a deviation in the trend.
Because of the desorption, the amount of free carbon was higher and thus the overall reading
was more than the other 3 readings. Furthermore, from the readings of Vb, Cdi and Cdo it is
found that the amount of CO2 in the sump tank was higher than the sample point. That’s why
the indication of C02 in the sample sump tank of achieved faster than the sample point. Because
the ration of free C was more there.

Conclusion:
From the performed experiment it is concluded that the rate of absorption depends upon the
time. As the time increases the rate of absorption decreases because the concentration gradient
decreases. The driving force of the absorption or diffusion is the concentration gradient and if
the driving force is less then absorption will also be less. Moreover, it is observed that time is
inversely proportional to the concentration gradient. Because time leads to a decrease of a

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06

concentration gradient. Furthermore, the dissolved CO2 ratio in the sump tank is higher than the
sample point because in the sample point just the top water has absorbed the CO2 while the
water that was in the sump tank absorbed both the columns CO2 so, therefore the amount of
C02 absorbed in the sump tank was higher than the sample point.

References:
1. Y.A. Cengel and A.S. Ghajar; Heat and Mass Transfer: Fundamentals and Applications; MC
Graw-Hill, 6th Edition, 2020.
2. Raj Chhabra V. Shankar Coulson and Richardson’s Chemical Engineering Volume 1B: Heat
and Mass Transfer: Fundamentals and Applications Seventh.
3. https://www.demisterpads.com/demister-pad/packed-
tower.html#:~:text=The%20packed%20tower%20is%20composed,hold%2Ddown%20gri
d%2C%20etc.&text=Liquid%20enters%20from%20tower%20top,down%20along%20the
%20packing%20surface.
4. https://www.academia.edu/36855621/CHE504_Lab_Report_on_Gas_Absorption_L8_20
18_

Areeba Naqvi B20F0454CHE030 LAB 06