Novel Reactive Distillation Process for Cyclohexyl Acetate Production: Design, Optimization, and Control

A side-reactor column (SRC) configuration, com-prising a vacuum column coupled with atmospheric side reactors, is proposed to overcome the thermodynamic restriction in the esterification of cyclohexene with acetic acid to produce cyclohexyl acetate. Meantime, this configuration can avoid the utilization of the high-pressure steam and provide enough zone for catalyst loading. In order to obtain the minimum total annual cost (TAC), the process is optimized by a mixed-integer nonlinear program-ming optimization method based on the improved bat algorithm. The results indicate that the optimized SRC configuration saves about 44.81% of the TAC compared to the reactive distillation process. Based on the optimized SRC process, dynamic control is carried out. The dual-point temperature and temperature -composition control structures are proposed to reject throughput and feed composition disturbances. The dynamic performances demonstrate that the temperature-composition control structure is better in maintaining product purity.

Automated summary

A side-reactor column (SRC) configuration is proposed to overcome the thermodynamic restriction in the esterification process. The configuration saves cost and provides enough catalyst loading zone. The optimized SRC process shows better dynamic control and product purity compared to the reactive distillation process.