Abstract: The CECE process conditions are experimentally studied for H₂O-H₂ liquid catalytic isotopic exchange with Pt-SDB as hydrophobic catalyst. The results indicate that the performance of packing pretreated with acid is better than that pretreated with alkali. The main impact factors for the catalytic exchange bed resistance drop are operating temperature and the hydrogen flow rate. The height equivalent of theoretical plate (HETP) is also changed to be higher with the increasing of the CECE column diameter and the packing dimension. The efficiency of catalytic exchange reaction is high with a packing ratio of 4.5∶1.0 of hydrophilic packing and hydrophobic catalyst in separated layers. The HETP decreases with increasing operating temperature, but the trend is slowed down when the temperature is above 70℃. The HETP increases with increasing the mole rate of hydrogen flow and the diluted heavy water flow.