A novel electrolytic bubble column reactor with an inner draft tube for
efficient microbial electrosynthesis of acetate
Abstract
The low current density impedes the practical application of microbial
electrosynthesis (MES) for CO2 fixation. Engineering the reactor design
is an effective way to increase the current density, especially for
H2-mediated MES reactors. The electrolytic bubble column MES reactor has
shown great potential for scaling up, but the mixing and gas mass
transfer still need to be enhanced. Here we introduced an inner draft
tube to the bubble column to tackle the problem. The addition of draft
tube resulted in a 76.6% increase in the volumetric mass transfer
coefficient (kLa) of H2 and a 40% increase in the maximum current
density (337 A/m2). The computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations
showed that the addition of draft tube enhanced mixing efficiency by
enabling a more ordered cyclic flow pattern and a more uniform
gas/liquid distribution. These results indicate that the electro-bubble
column reactor with draft tube holds great potential for industrial
implementation.