Making Photochemistry Scalable - An Operationally Simple Falling Film Looping Photoreactor

Visible light-driven organic transformations have become very widespread due to their energy efficiency, process simplicity and high selectivity. Since photoreactions occur in a wide range of wavelengths and conditions, designing a specific reactor is very strenuous and challenging. Especially when it comes to the transfer of photoreactor concepts from the laboratory to larger scale. Crucial links for the scale-up process are still missing. Ideally, a scale-up process should be performed within the same type of reactor ensuring comparable reaction conditions. To resolve this issue, a new looping photoreactor was designed and manufactured that recirculates the reaction mixture and generates a falling film within the photoreactor. The reactor concept allows small-scale photoreactions to be carried out on a laboratory scale and demonstrates the scalability of the reactor concept without major changes to the reaction conditions.