Fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) is a crucial conversion process in a petroleum refinery

which produces important chemicals

e.g. gasoline

diesel

light olefins

etc. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling of FCC reaction processes assists to understand the behaviors of flow and reaction in FCC riser reactors

design and optimize the FCC units

and finally provide the guidance for production and implement the virtual tuning and scale up of processes. This study reviews the recent processes in the multiphase flow models

reaction kinetics and the coupling between flow and FCC reaction. In terms of the coupling approaches

summaries and critical comments are present from the usage of turbulent models

the impact of flow structures

more sophisticated models to crude oil vaporization models. Based on the previous studies

it is pointed out by the authors that although CFD modeling can well reveal the behaviors of flow and reaction in FCC riser reactor of industrial scale

the current theoretical models and modeling techniques have a long way to run up with the experiment counterpart since there is no successful application of CFD reactive modeling of a series of FCC riser reactors ranging from a bench scale to the industrial scale. For the future of FCC reactive modeling

it is very necessary to emphasize the studies on the modeling and the computing efficiency

then strike a balance between them to realize the virtual process engineering.