Radiotracer Applications in Chemical Process Industry

Measurements of liquid phase residence time distributions in a pilot-scale continuous leaching reactor using radiotracer technique

“…Residence time distribution (RTD) analysis is very useful to access the design of the continuously operating chemical process equipment and optimize their operating parameters (Levenspiel, 1972). Radiotracer techniques are commonly used for measurement of RTD of flowing process material in pilot as well as full-scale industrial systems and determine flow parameters such as mean residence time (MRT), bypassing, extent of dead volume present and degree of mixing (Charlton, 1986;IAEA, 1990;Thyn et al, 2000;Pant et al, 2001aPant et al, , 2001bPant et al, , 2009aPant et al, , 2009bPant et al, , 2012Pant and Yelgoankar, 2002;Samantray et al, 2014). The results of RTD analysis obtained in pilot-scale systems are utilized to scale up the process.…”

Residence time distribution measurements in a pilot-scale poison tank using radiotracer technique

“…In addition to this, RTD is also used to improve the design of the existing industrial systems; to optimize design of new systems at the design stage itself. Radiotracer techniques are widely used for measurement of RTD in full-scale as well as pilotscale industrial systems because of their specific advantages over conventional tracers (Charlton, 1986;IAEA, 1990IAEA, , 2004Thyn et al, 2000;Blet, 2000;Pant et al, 2000Pant et al, , 2001Pant et al, , 2009aPant et al, , 2009b, 2015, Pant and Yelgoankar, 2002Borroto, 2003 Dagadu et al, 2012). This paper discusses measurements of RTD of liquid phase in a pilot-scale boron poison tank using the radiotracer technique.…”

Leak detection in a high-pressure heat exchanger system in a refinery using radiotracer technique

“…Occurrence of leakage in underground pipelines and industrial process systems such as heat exchangers is one of the commonly encountered problems in the process industry [1][2][3][4][5][6]. A leak is an undesirable interconnection between isolated parts of any system or between two systems and affects one or more of the following: production efficiency, product quality, material inventory, safety and environment [1,2,4].…”

“…These techniques are either offline measurement techniques or cannot be applied in industrial systems for online measurement due to their complexity and the harsh conditions [2]. On the other hand, radiotracers have a number of advantages such as high detection sensitivity, in situ detection, physical chemical compatibility, limited memory effect, unambiguous detection and results can be obtained quickly [1,3,[6][7][8][9][10]. Hence, only radiotracers offer the possibility of on-line measurements, providing information in the shortest possible time.…”

“…This minimizes the expensive down time of the large capacity petrochemicals plants. Leak detection in a heat exchanger system using the radiotracer technique involves the selection of a suitable radioisotope, estimation of the necessary radioactivity, injection of the radiotracer in the tube side or the shell side of the heat exchanger, whichever is at higher pressure, and monitoring of the radiotracer at the shell side or the tube side of the heat exchanger, whichever is at lower pressure, using pre-calibrated radiation detectors [2, [4][5][6]. The appearance of the radiotracer at lower pressure side either shell or tube of the heat exchanger indicates the leaking heat exchanger.…”