(686g) Can Reactive Distillation and Divided Wall Column Replace All the Known Chemical Processes?

Reactive distillation (RD) and divided wall column (DWC) are two of the most successful examples of process intensification technologies for enhanced chemical manufacturing [1]. Although these technologies have achieved a high degree of maturity in terms of installation capabilities and availability of commercial suppliers, questions remain on their applicability and operability [2]. Task wise RD combines chemical reactions and product separation in one unit, while DWC combines the operations of two conventional columns in one shell. Recently, reactive DWCs have also been proposed.

Based on the above, can a RD-DWC (RD with or without a DWC) be configured to represent a chemical process? What requirements will they need to satisfy? A survey of chemical processes (patents and published process flowsheets) indicate that chemical processes with a reactor operating in the liquid and/or vapor phases followed by energy intensive separation tasks involving vapor-liquid phases, are potential candidates for application of RD-DWC. This is because many chemical processes are characterized by exothermic reactions followed by one or more energy intensive vapor–liquid separations. Also, some downstream separation sequences involving 3-4 compounds could be replaced by a DWC.

The presentation will propose a set of rules that can guide the designer to establish apriori, if a RD-DWC would be able to represent the requirements of a chemical process. If yes, then the computer-aided process intensification techniques that are being developed [2], can be applied to generate sustainable and intensified alternatives to the traditional unit operation based chemical processes. This rule-based technique can be applied to synthesize and design new chemical processes as well as generate retrofit intensified alternatives. The applicability of the intensified solution should be verified through techno-economic analysis combined with operability, safety, etc., analysis.

In the presentation, the features of chemical processes that make them suitable for replacement with RD-DWC will be highlighted through an analysis of numerous chemical process flowsheets. The rules plus computer-aided process intensification [2] are applied to generate new and sustainable alternatives. The potential impact of this rule-based technique is very high considering the number of chemical processes that match the requirements for their replacement by RD-DWC is very high.

REFERENCES:

• Tian Y, Demirel SE, Hasan MMF, Pistikopoulos EN. An overview of process systems engineering approaches for process intensification: State of the art. Chemical Engineering & Processing: Process Intensification. 2018; 133: 160.
• Tula A.K, Eden M.R, Gani R. Computer-aided process intensification: Challenges, trends and opportunities. AIChE, (2020;66:e16819).