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Mathematical modelling has become an essential tool in the design of modern catalytic systems. Emissions legislation is becoming increasingly stringent, and so mathematical models of aftertreatment systems must become more accurate in order to provide confidence that a catalyst will convert pollutants over the required range of conditions. Automotive catalytic converter models contain several sub-models that represent processes such as mass and heat transfer, and the rates at which the reactions proceed on the surface of the precious metal. Of these sub-models, the prediction of the surface reaction rates is by far the most challenging due to the complexity of the reaction system and the large number of gas species involved.

One of the most critical aspects in the development of a kinetic model for automotive applications is the method used to control the switch between limiting factors over the period of the chemical reaction, namely mass transfer and reaction kinetics. This balance becomes increasingly more critical with the automotive application with the gas composition and gas flow varying throughout the automotive cycles resulting in a large number of competing reactions, with a constantly changing space velocity. A methodology is presented that successfully switches the limitation between mass transfer and reaction kinetics. This method originally developed for the global kinetics model using the Langmuir Hinshelwood approach for kinetics is presented. The methodology presented is further expanded to the much more complex micro-kinetics approach taking into account various kinetic steps such as adsorption/desorption and surface reactions.

With emission legislation becoming ever more stringent, automotive companies are forced to invest heavily into solutions to meet the targets set. To date the most effective way of treating emissions is through the use of catalytic converters. Current testing methods of catalytic converters whether being tested on a vehicle or in a lab reactor can be expensive and offer little information about what is occurring within the catalyst. It is for this reason and the increased price of precious metal that kinetic modeling has become a popular alternative to experimental testing. Many kinetic models and kinetic parameters have appeared in literature in recent years, a comparison of these kinetic parameters for the global reaction of CO oxidation is presented.