The separation of the homogeneous azeotropic mixture acetonitrile/water by pressure swing distillation (PSD) is considered. The PSD is operated as a discontinuous (batch) process and two batch modes, regular and inverted, are considered. The processes are analysed, aspects as to which batch mode should be preferred are discussed, and a dynamic model for both batch PSD processes is formulated. T...

Design, economics, and plantwide control of a glycerol-tert-butyl alcohol (TBA) etherification plant are presented. The reaction takes place in liquid phase, in a plug flow reactor, using Amberlyst 15 as a catalyst. The products' separation is achieved by two distillation columns where high-purity ethers are obtained and a section involving extractive distillation with 1,4-butanediol as solvent...

In this paper, we address the conceptual design of the bioethanol process from switchgrass via gasification. A superstructure is postulated for optimizing energy use that embeds direct or indirect gasification, followed by steam reforming or partial oxidation. Next, the gas composition is adjusted with membrane-PSA or water gas shift. Membrane separation, absorption with ethanol-amines and PSA ...

Solar distillation is very much effective for availing drinkable pot water, especially in desert areas and salt-producing areas. A Still a device that can be used to convert impure (saline) water into fresh drinking using the process of Distillation. The energy source sunlight thus it uses renewable energy. This paper describes set equations find distillate yield solar still by taking input par...

From a design and hydraulic standpoint, trays are relatively complex distillation internals. In the ongoing search for higher performance trays, one first must understand the hydraulic and mass transfer aspects of the tray operation such as entrainment, downcomer flooding, and vapor liquid contact. When this is well understood, then various aspects of the deck and/or downcomer designs can more ...

The continuous fast pyrolysis of soybean oil in a pilot plant was investigated. The experimental runs were carried out according to an experimental design alternating the temperature (from 450 to 600 degrees C) and the concentration of water (from 0% to 10%). The liquid products were analyzed by gas chromatography and by true boiling point (TPB) distillation. A simple distillation was used to o...

A simple experiment such as the batch distillation of an ethanol–water binary mixture can be performed in a 3-h laboratory session using a very rudimentary apparatus consisting of a still pot and two thermocouples. Yet, the results can lead to very interesting insights to distillation and chemical engineering thermodynamics. The present article describes how one can exploit this simple laborato...