Feasible products in batch reactive distillation

Abstract

A systematic feasibility evaluation for batch reactive distillation systems is addressed. In each batch configuration, feasibility criteria are obtained for ternary reactive systems by using residual curve maps (RCMs) and reaction equilibrium manifolds. If one of the reaction products is an unstable node (UN) and is reachable from all distillation regions, a rectifier can be used for producing pure products. Even if this unstable node is only reachable from one specific distillation region, a rectifier can still be used when a part of the reaction equilibrium curve lies within the same distillation region as the product. Symmetric results are conserved for a batch stripper with one stable node (SN) product. Finally, pure products are produced in middle-vessel columns when the UN and SN products share the same distillation region with a part of the reaction equilibrium curve. Although these criteria are obtained for ternary systems, they can be extended to multicomponent reactive systems.