Oxygen transfer to slurries treated in a rotating drum operated at atmospheric pressure

The objective of this work was to determine (1) the effect of rotational speed (N) and lifters on the oxygen transfer coefficient (k (L)) of a mineral solution and (2) the effect of solids concentration of a slurry soil-mineral solution on k (L), at a fixed value N (0.25 s(-1)); in both cases the treatment was carried out in an aerated rotating drum reactor (RDR) operated at atmospheric pressure. First, the k (L) for the mineral solution was in the range 6.38 x 10(-4)-7.69 x 10(-4) m s(-1), which was of the same order of magnitude as those calculated for closed rotating drums supplied with air flow. In general, k (L) of RDR implemented with lifters was superior or equal to that of RDR without lifters. For RDR implemented with lifters, k (L) increased with N in the range 6.65 x 10(-4)-10.51 x 10(-4) m s(-1), whereas k (L) of RDR without lifters first increased with N up to N = 0.102 s(-1), and decreased beyond this point. Second, regarding soil slurry experiments, an abrupt fall of k (L) (ca. 50%) at low values of the solid concentration (C (v)) and an asymptotic pattern at high C (v) were observed at N = 0.25 s(-1). These results suggest that mass transfer phenomena were commanded by the slurry properties and a semi-empirical equation of the form Sh = f(Re, Sc) seems to corroborate this finding.