Kinetics of solid acid catalyzed toluene nitration using the incremental identification method D. V. Gayatri • I. Sreedhar Received: 26 June 2014 / Accepted: 12 September 2014 Ó Akade ´miai Kiado ´, Budapest, Hungary 2014 Abstract In the present study, a novel technique of incremental identification has been employed to estimate the kinetic parameters for the title reaction. Initially, its performance has been validated with the reported data on mixed acid toluene nitration conducted in batch mode by comparing the kinetic parameters reported and those estimated by this methodology. After the necessary validation, this incre- mental method has been employed for the zeolite catalyzed toluene nitration con- ducted in semi batch mode under reflux conditions to estimate the rate due to the reaction as 0.1056 mol/m 3 s and that due to mass transfer as 3.1827 9 10 -5 mol/ m 3 s. These values are found to be in agreement with the reported values. Various kinetic models have also been tested for the best fit of the experimental data and the best model has been found to be Langmuir–Hinshelwood, which has given the lowest error in the regression analysis. The controlling regime of reaction control that was identified by this study has also been further validated using empirical estimates like the Hatta number. Keywords Multiphase kinetics  Zeolite toluene  Nitration  Incremental identification method  Kinetic model Introduction Aromatic nitro compounds find commercial applications as intermediates in various industries such as pharmaceuticals, dyes, perfumes, pesticides, explosives, polymers and fertilizers [1]. Among these aromatic nitro compounds, nitrotoluene production from the nitration of toluene is one of the widely studied organic reactions. The issue of achieving improved para-selectivity, controlled reaction pathway and D. V. Gayatri  I. Sreedhar (&) Department of Chemical Engineering, BITS Pilani Hyderabad Campus, Hyderabad 500078, India e-mail: isreedhar2001@yahoo.co.in 123 Reac Kinet Mech Cat DOI 10.1007/s11144-014-0784-1