MPI Colloquia Series: Prof. Michael Shoham Patrascu, Technion, Haifa, Israel: Development of Membrane Reactors for Sustainable Processes

The Max Planck Institute Magdeburg invites you to its series of colloquia.
Top-class scientists, from notable German and worldwide research institutions, give a survey of their research work.

Everybody who is interested, is invited to attend.

Dial-in via Zoom: https://eu02web.zoom-x.de/j/7302508065

Abstract

Process intensification (PI) has the potential to break the traditional chemical industry paradigm of ‘economy-of-scale’, by creating economic value even at low scales. Implementation of mature PI technologies together with other economic benefits of decentralized production (such as cheaper, simpler, and more efficient distribution and storage systems) may lead to a very different mode of production for some basic chemicals and fuels.
Membrane reactors are reactive separation units where reaction and separation by a membrane are integrated to intensify a chemical process. In this talk I will describe our efforts to understand and develop novel processess based on membrane reactors for hydrogen production and for CO2 utilization. Pd membranes are used in membrane reactors for decentralized pure hydrogen production. In-situ steam separation by zeolitic (e.g. LTA) or carbon membranes is a promising concept enabling the development of novel CO2 utilization routes where water are formed as a byproduct. The methods we use to study and develop such systems span from modelling molecular level interactions, through unit-scale modeling up to plant-wide simulations. I will also discuss some of our experimental techniques and systems used for the study of membrane reactors.

About the speaker (Google Scholar)

Michael Patrascu holds a PhD in chemical engineering from the Technion (2015). He has won the Process Intensification Excellence Award from the European Federation of Chemical Engineering for his PhD dissertation on scaled down hydrogen production in Pd-membrane reactors. In his postdoctoral work at MIT (2015-2017) Michael has developed and demonstrated dynamic optimization techniques applied in the field of continuous manufacturing of pharmaceuticals. Later, Michael spent 3 years as a senior researcher at the R&D center of ExxonMobil, NJ, USA, where among others he developed novel GTL processes and OSN membrane separations. In 2020 Michael has joined the Faculty of Chemical Engineering at the Technion, Israel, as the head of the Process Intensification and Reaction Engineering Lab. His focus is on membrane reactors for hydrogen production and CO2 utilization, process dynamics and optimization, and on-board catalytic reactors.