A Scalable Dynamic Cascade Flow Reactor for Challenging Continuous Heterogeneous Processes

Continuous processes (often referred to as flow chemistry) offers multiple advantages over batch processes and are of particular interest for industrial applications as they provide a more direct path towards process intensification, increased safety and efficiency. However, some chemical processes are still challenging to run in a continuous fashion, such as reactions producing fouling, using stoichiometric amounts of solids, or requiring long residence times. For those kinds of reactions, batch approaches are usually preferred even though some processes would still benefit from the advantages inherent to flow. We herein report our testing and development of a scalable continuous flow reactor equipped with active mixing that was designed to handle those challenging continuous processes, such as the continuous formation of a Grignard reagent from a magnesium powder slurry.