Simulated Heat Integration Study of Reactive Distillation Column for Ethanol Synthesis

Ethanol is largely used as a solvent in the synthesis of varnishes and perfumes. It is also used as a preservative for biological products, fuel, and gasoline additives. An ethanol-water mixture, normally obtained by fractional distillation yields an azeotropic solution consisting of approximately 95 w% of ethanol. The synthesis of ethanol in a reactive distillation column with the azeotropic feed at 20 degrees C with ethylene oxide as another reactant feed for the reaction with water to produce ethylene glycol was simulated in Aspenplus. Simulated results show 98.82 mol% purity of ethanol in the reactive distillation column. In order to reduce the energy consumption in reactive distillation, a Reactive Heat Integrated Distillation Column (R-HIDiC) is proposed for the same purity of ethanol product. From the simulated results, it has been found that the overall energy utilization in the proposed distillation column is reduced by 65% as compared to the conventional reactive distillation column. The pressure profile, temperature profile, and concentration profile of the reactive distillation column and the column proposed are also compared.