Our expertise and laboratory to develop processes involving chemical reactions.

In brief

Developing industrial processes involving chemical reactions is at the heart of Processium’s business. We believe that the reaction and purification stages must be studied simultaneously to make the overall process as efficient as possible.

We complement our customers’ chemical know-how with our expertise in process engineering, from both the reaction and purification standpoints.

Services

• Orientation testing, screening or reagents, solvents and catalysts;
• Acquisition and modeling of kinetic data;
• Acquisition of calorimetric data to characterize reactions from a thermal standpoint;
• Choice of reactor technology;
• Experimental validation of models and of the reaction’s performance at laboratory scale;
• Production of samples;
• Sizing and support in working with an equipment supplier

Digital

Processium uses two approaches to model reactions:

• Development of kinetic models, determining the reaction order, frequency factor, activation energy and reaction reversibility;
• Development of statistical models, called “trend models”.

As part of collaborative research projects, Processium has developed tools to guide the choice of industrial reactor technology very early on in the design process. These technologies may be paired with a separation stage. The tools enable:

• Identification of missing data to size the reactor and validate the choice of technology;
• Performance of initial laboratory tests directly on a technology representative of that to be used in the future industrial reactor.

DATAFAB joint lab

Processium has set up DATAFAB, a joint lab with the CP2M lab at the Chemistry Institute of Lyon (CPE).

DATAFAB aims to develop cutting-edge tools to acquire kinetic data on complex (very fast and exothermic) reactions. It is now able, through an innovative methodology, to acquire reliable intrinsic kinetic data required to develop intensified reaction processes.

Reactors

Processium has a wide range of reactors, with batch or continuous operation. The technology is carefully chosen based on the stage of the project and the test objectives. The list below shows the main reactors Processium has access to:

• Batch reactors, from a few milliliters to around 10 liters;
• CSTR reactors;
• Fixed bed;
• Static mixers;
• Microreactors, mesoreactors, tubular reactors;
• 2.45 GHz microwave reactor;
• Corning Low Flow;
• COBR;
• Robinson-Mahoney;
• Kobelco;
• Ehrfeld and more.

Analytical resources

Processium has analytical resources enabling it to directly determine reaction performance:

• HPLC (UV-Vis, RI, ELS);
• GC (MS, FID, TCD);
• US-Vis spectrophotometry;
• Online infrared analysis.