Hydrodynamic and mass transfer performance of a new aero-ejector with its application to VOC abatement

The aero-ejector, an in-house developed gas–liquid contactor, ensures an improved gas–liquid contact, favorable to a high mass transfer in a small volume: its transfer capacity enables the elimination of 90% of pollutants from gaseous effluents in a single treatment. Through its characteristics, its use as a transfer device into a treatment process has distinct advantages. However, such an application needs modifications to make the contactor suitable for use in an industrial context (efficiency, compactness and low pressure drop). The aim of this research is to improve the contactor geometry in order to enhance its performances. Modifications have resulted in an energy improvement since an inlet gaseous pressure of 0.05×105Pa was reached for a QG/QL ratio in excess of 10 and with a small loss of transfer efficiency. The study of the effect of operating parameters has identified a sizing criterion, the “useful volume”. This can be used to determine an optimal configuration for the gas–liquid contactor taking into account constraints such as pollutant solubility, pressure drop or compactness.