Chiyoda Corporation

Tonen Corporation

Chieko Nagasawa

Takeshi Minami

Noriyuki Yoneda

Akihisa Yamaguchi

Kazuhiko Hamato

Hideki Sugiyama

Fumihiko Uemura

Tadashi Matsumoto

Yasuo Hosono

Munenori Maekawa

Rei Sato

Acetic acid is manufactured by carbonylating methanol with carbon monoxide by way of a heterogeneous catalytic reaction in a bubble column reactor. The carbonylating reaction is conducted with a solid catalyst concentration of not less than 100 kg/m3 in terms of the reaction volume. For the reaction, the partial pressure of carbon monoxide in the reactor is confined to a range between 1.0 and 2.5 MPa while the exhaustion ratio of carbon monoxide is confined to a range between 3 and 15% of the theoretical reaction volume of carbon monoxide and the liquid superficial velocity is made to be found in a range between 0.2 and 1.0 m/sec.

Method of manufacturing acetic acid

Catalyst particles are contacted with a liquid and a gas in a vertically extending cylindrical vessel. The particles and liquid are placed in the vessel into which the gas and liquid are continuously fed from the bottom thereof so that an upwardly flowing mixture comprising the particles, liquid and gas is formed. The mixture is introduced into a gas separating zone disposed adjacent to an upper portion of the vessel to separate the mixture by gravity into a gas phase, a supernatant liquid phase and a phase rich in the catalyst particles. The gas and supernatant phases are continuously withdrawn from the separating zone while the catalyst particles-rich phase is continuously recycled to the bottom of the vessel by gravity.

Method of contacting catalyst particles with gas and liquid

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Kamakura, Japan

Chieko Nagasawa