Optimisation of the conceptual design of reactive distillation columns

Abstract

It is shown that the introduction of a different tray holdup in the stripper and rectifyer section of a continuous kinetically controlled reactive distillation column facilitates the design procedure. It also creates a range of design alternatives, generating the possibility to optimise for both the total number of trays and the total liquid holdup in the column. This allows for minimising investment related costs such as the column height and the amount of catalyst. When investigating the influence of product specifications and process parameters such as the heat of reaction and the stoichiometric sum on column design, the introduced range of design alternatives should be compared rather than single designs.