Combining extractive heterogeneous-azeotropic distillation and hydrophilic pervaporation for enhanced separation of non-ideal ternary mixtures

Abstract

The separation of non-ideal mixtures using distillation can be an extremely complex process and there continues to be a need to further improve these techniques. A new method which combines extractive heterogeneous-azeotropic distillation (EHAD) and hydrophilic pervaporation (HPV) for the separation of non-ideal ternary mixtures is demonstrated. This improved distillation method combines the benefits of heterogeneous-azeotropic and extractive distillations in one column but no added materials are needed as is usually the case with pervaporation. The separation of water-methanol-ethyl acetate and water-methanol-isopropyl acetate mixtures were investigated to demonstrate the accuracy of the combined EHAD/HPV technique. There is not currently an established treatment strategy for the separation of the second mixtures in the literature. These separation processes were rigorously modelled and optimized using a professional flowsheet. The objective functions were total cost and energy consumption and heat integration was also investigated. The verification of the process modelling was carried out using laboratory-scale measurements. Extractive heterogeneous-distillation combined with methanol dehydration was found to be more efficient than conventional distillation for the separation of these highly non-ideal mixtures.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

hydrophilic pervaporation / non-ideal mixture / modelling / extractive heterogeneous-azeotropic distillation / heat integration

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Open Access

This work was supported by the János Bolyai Research Scholarship of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, ÚNKP-18-4-BME-209 New National Excellence Program of the Ministry of Human Capacities, OTKA 112699, 128543 and 131586. This research was supported by the European Union and the Hungarian State, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund in the framework of the GINOP-2.3.4-15-2016-00004 project, aimed to promote the cooperation between the higher education and the industry. The research reported in this paper has been supported by the National Research, Development and Innovation Fund (TUDFO/51757/2019-ITM, Thematic Excellence Program).

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