St.

Joseph’s College of Engineering

Department of Chemical Engineering

CH8791 TRANSPORT PHENOMENA

B S Rathi
Assistant Professor
Department of Chemical Engineering
St. Joseph’s College of Engineering
 Unit 4

Shell mass balances, Boundary conditions, Concentration profiles, Average concentration,

Diffusion with Diffusion and chemical

Mass flux at surfaces for
homogeneous and Diffusion in to a falling reaction in porous catalyst
Diffusion through
heterogeneous chemical liquid film, and the effectiveness
stagnant gas film,
reaction, factor,

Equation of change to set

Equation of continuity for up diffusion problems for
binary mixtures, simultaneous heat and
mass transfer
Equation for the rate of mass transfer in respect of
‘diffusion through a stagnant film’
Equation for the rate of mass transfer in respect of
‘diffusion through a stagnant film’
+ Consider the diffusion system shown in Fig. Liquid A is evaporating into gas B,
and we imagine that by some means the liquid level at z=z1, is maintained
constant. Right at the Liq-gas interface the gas phase concentration of A,
expressed as mole fraction is xA1. This is taken to be the gas phase
concentration of A corresponding to equilibrium with the liquid at the interface:
i. e., xA1 is the vapour pressure of A divided by the total pressure, [P A(vap) /P],
provided that A and B form an ideal gas mixture. It is to be further assumed
that the solubility of B in A is negligible.
+ At the top of the tube (at z = z2) a stream of gas mixture A-B of concentration
XA2 flows past slowly; thereby the mole fraction of A at the top of the column is
maintained at xA2. The entire system is presumed to be held at constant
temperature and pressure. Gases A and B are assumed to be ideal.
+ When this evaporating system attains steady state, there is a net motion of A
away from the evaporating surface and the vapour B is stationary. Hence we
can use the expression for NAz as given in the general molar flux equation with
NBz =0 :
+ NAz = -c DAB( xA / z) + xA(NAz + NBz)
+ Becomes NAz = - c DAB (1 – xA) ( xA / z) ----[1]
A mass balance over an incremental column height z states that at steady state:

+ S NAz|z - S NAz|z+ z = 0 ----- [2]

+ In which S is the cross sectional area of the column. Division by S z and

taking limit as z  0 gives
+ (dN Az / dz) = 0 ------ [3]
Substitution of Eqn[1] into Eqn[3] gives:
(d/dz) {[c DAB /(1- xA)](xA / z)} = 0 ---- [4]
+ For ideal gas mixtures at constant temperature and pressure, c is a constant
and DAB is very nearly independent of concentration. Hence Eqn. [4] becomes:
+ (d/dz) {[1/(1- xA)](xA / z)} = 0 ---- [5]
+ This is a second order differential equation for the concentration profile
expressed as mole fraction of A. Integration with respect to z gives:
+ {[1/(1- xA)](xA / z)} =C1 ---- [6]
A second integration then gives:
- ln(1- xA) = C1 z + C2 ---- [7]
The two constants of integration may be determined using the boundary
conditions:
B.C.1: at z = z1, xA = xA1 ---- [8] ;
B.C.2: at z = z2, xA = xA2 ---- [9]
+ On substituting the expressions for the integration constants the following
expression for the concentration profile is obtained:
+
+ Concentration Profile
+ Z=z1, Z=0,
+ Z=z2, Z=1,
Flux
Diffusion with heterogeneous Chemical Reaction
Diffusion with homogeneous reaction
Average Concentration
+ Flux
Diffusion in to Falling Liquid Film
Diffusion and chemical reaction inside a porous
spherical catalyst particle
Flux
Equation of continuity for binary mixtures
+ Constant

+ Constant
+ With zero velocity