Research Experiences for Undergraduates
Summer 2003
Project Summary
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Research Experiences for Undergraduates Summer 2003 Project Summary |
Project Title: Physical Property Modeling from Equations of State.
Student Name: Chris Emborsky
Student’s home institution: Rose-Holman Institute of Technology
Research Advisor(s): Dr. Michael Misovich
Source of Support: NSF-REU
In the world of chemical engineering, there is a great emphasis put upon process
modeling and preliminary calculations before a project or plant gets to the
construction phase. For this reason, it is necessary to develop accurate methods
of predicting species behavior. Therefore, a quick and accurate method using
a series expansion has been proposed.
Some of the more involved calculations in this industry are concerning vapor-liquid
equilibrium. These calculations include everything from predicting phase properties
to predicting the phase transitions. In an effort to simplify the calculations,
a calculus method has been adapted known as a series expansion. In order to
do this, an appropriate equation of state has to be selected that works well
for modeling the species in both phases. For the specific part of this research,
previous results for the reduced vapor pressure series using the Soave-Redlich-Kwong
equation of state were used.
The goal of my research was to manipulate the Clausius-Clapeyron equation into
reduced variables and produce two new sets of series coefficients for the reduced
change in volume and the reduced enthalpy (of vaporization). The Clausius-Clapeyron
equation gives a mathematical relationship between the heat of vaporization,
vapor pressure, temperature, and difference in phase volumes.
Once the coefficients were determined and the series expanded, the accuracy
of the two series was checked against the exact solution using the equation
of state. Also, a figure of the percent error using a certain number of terms
was produced as a function of the reduced temperature and acentric factor. This
provides anyone using the series approximation with an idea as to how much error
is inherent in their calculation by using the series instead of the exact calculation
for their particular species at their particular temperature.
More details on this process and the results can be found in the related PowerPoint
presentation or by contacting Dr. Misovich.
Slide show of Chris Emborsky's work (Requires Microsoft PowerPoint or a PowerPoint viewer.