Vivek V. Buwa
Ph.D. Student

Ekta Jain
Indian Oil Research Scholar
Department of Chemical Engineering,
Indian Institute of Technology Delhi,
Hauzkhas, New Delhi 110 016,
India.
Tel: +91-11-2659 6252
e-mail: ektajain2908@gmail.com 
Educational Qualification
  • Ph.D. (Chemical Engineering), Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India (Aug 2013- ongoing)
      • Thesis title: Gas-Liquid Distributors for Trickle Bed Reactors (sponsored by Indian Oil Corporation R&D Center)
      (Advisor: Prof. Vivek. V. Buwa, IIT Delhi and Dr. M. Sau, Indian Oil Corporation R&D Center)
  • M.Tech. (Chemical Engineering), Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, India (2013)
      • Thesis title: Isopropylation of m-cresol for maximum selective yield of thymol over solid acid catalyst
      (Advisor: Dr. U. Sreedevi)
  • B.Tech. (Chemical Engineering), Laxminarayan Institute of Technology, Nagpur, India (2010)
Work Experience
  • Thermax Limited, Pune (Aug 2010- July 2011), worked as Ion-exchange Resin marketing executive for specialty resin business
Research Interests
  • Dispersed and mixed gas-liquid flows through industrial distributors
  • Study of multiphase flow through packed beds using Electrical Resistance Tomography and CFD simulations
Research Topic: Gas-Liquid Distributors for Trickle Bed Reactors
Trickle bed reactors (TBRs) are widely used in the oil industry in hydro-treating, hydro-cracking and hydro-desulphurization processes. The development of gas-liquid distributors to achieve uniform liquid- and temperature-distribution, and intense gas-liquid contacting is crucial for efficient operation of TBRs. The present research work focusses on measurements of liquid hold-up distribution generated by different distributors that are relevant for industrial trickle bed reactors, and also for  development of experimentally verified computational fluid dynamics (CFD) based models to predict the performance of these distributors. The experimentally verified CFD models will be used to optimize the performance of existing gas-liquid distributors and to evolve new distributor designs.
     Distributor I               Distributor II                  Distributor III     Distributor IV
Photograph of a typical dual-tip voidage probe
Optmization of gas-liquid distributor design to achieve more uniform liquid distribution Every peak in the voltage fluctuation graph shows presence of non-conductive fluid in the medium, as seen in the video (above)
   
In-house developed voidage probes were used to study the morphology of flow through different gas-liquid distributors (left). Image on right shows a representative voltage signal for two different types of gas-liquid distributors. These signals can help in comparing different types of gas-liquid distributors on the basis of their inherent flow-type.
 
 
CFD predictions of liquid distribution, and velocity magnitudes of liquid and gas for flow through standard chimney (left) and standard bubble cap (right) using Eulerian-Eulerian simulations
 
 
 
 
Highly time-resolved and intrusive measurement technique- Voidage probes, were used to identify the flow-regimes inside the TBR. Modified voidage sensors were used to study the effect of different gas and liquid flow rates on the flow-regime and dispersion inside the bed.
 
   

The effect of liquid-distributor configurations (semi-uniform, local and one-sided) was investigated on the radial liquid distribution at different axial locations of TBR and the corresponding measurements were validated using bottom liquid collection method. Further, the ability of ERT to measure time-resolved local liquid distribution was verified using voidage sensors for artificially created pulsing flow. The ERT measurements were performed to quantify the effects of gas and liquid flow rates, and particle size on the local liquid holdup. (Singh et al., 2019)
 
Publications 
International/National Journals
  • Brajesh K. Singh, Ekta Jain  and Vivek V. Buwa, Feasibility of Electrical Resistance Tomography for Measurements of Liquid Holdup Distribution in a Trickle Bed Reactor, Chemical Engineering Journal, 358 (2019), pp.564-579
International/National Conferences
  • Ekta Jain, Madhusudan Sau and Vivek Buwa, 2018, "A Methodology to  Simulate Gas-liquid Distribution through Distributor-trays using  Two-phase Eulerian Model", 10th International Conference on Multiphase Flow (ICMF 2019), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), 19 – 24 May 2019, Accepted for presentation.
  • Ekta Jain, Vivek V. Buwa and Madhusudan Sau, Gas-liquid Flow through Chimney and Bubble-cap Distributors, presented in 13th International Conference on Gas–Liquid and Gas–Liquid–Solid Reactor Engineering (GLS13), 2017, Brussels, Belgium.
  • Ekta Jain, Brajesh K. Singh and Vivek V. Buwa, Measurements of Local Liquid Volume Fraction Distribution and Flow Structures in a Trickle Bed using Electrical Resistance Tomography and Voidage Probes, presented in 13th International Conference on Gas–Liquid and Gas–Liquid–Solid Reactor Engineering (GLS13), 2017, Brussels, Belgium.
  • Brajesh K. Singh, Ekta Jain,  and Vivek V. Buwa, Spatial- and Time-resolved Measurements of Liquid Hold-up Distribution in a Packed Bed using Electrical Resistance Tomography and Voidage-Probes, 9th International Conference on Multiphase Flow (ICMF 2016), Florence, Italy.
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