Kinetics of supercritical water oxidation of methanol studied in a CSTR bymeans of Raman spectroscopy

A newly devised continuous flow stirred tank reactor (CSTR) was employed fo r the study of kinetics of supercritical water oxidation (SCWO) of methanol near the critical point (390-430 degreesC, 24.7 MPa), where the reaction p rogress was analyzed by means of Raman spectroscopy. The production of CH2O , CO, and CO2 through the oxidation reaction was directly detected. Methano l conversion as a function of residence time could be analyzed on the basis of a simple first-order CSTR reaction model including phenomenological ind uction time. The overall reaction rate thus obtained was well-reproduced th rough simulation by a detailed chemical kinetics model, which supports the belief that the radical chain reaction mechanism is responsible for methano l SCWO even near the critical point.