Design and Control of the Monoisopropylamine Process

Abstract

The monoisopropylamine (MIPA) process provides an interesting example of plantwide economic design optimization and plantwide control. The process consists of a tubular reactor and three distillation columns. There are both gas and liquid recycles. Fresh feed streams of isopropyl alcohol and ammonia are introduced into the process. The desired products are MIPA and water. An undesirable byproduct of di-isopropylamine (DIPA) is also produced and is recycled to extinction since its formation reaction is reversible. An excess of ammonia in the reactor inhibits the DIPA reaction, so ammonia is also recycled. The purpose of this paper is to present the details of the process for use by other workers as a test case for use in plantwide design and control studies. A heuristic economic optimum design and a control structure are developed. The process illustrates the classical design trade-off between reactor costs versus separation costs. In addition, the process has two recycles, which are both distillate products from different distillation columns, and this leads to another trade-off. Using more ammonia recycle produces less DIPA recycle. So the optimum design must balance the separation costs of the two recycles. Two of the distillation columns can be effectively controlled using a single temperature and a reflux-to-feed ratio control structure. The third column requires a dual control structure ratio (one temperature and one composition).