Abstract
The traditional two-column reactive distillation (RD) process is used for the production of butyric anhydride, which is synthesized with butyric acid and acetic anhydride via a reversible reaction. In this work, a novel process with a single RD column (SRDC) is designed for the production of butyric anhydride, where the second distillation column for separating excess reactant is removed based on the boiling point profile of the reaction system. Two applications of the proposed SRDC process, namely SRDC with excess butyric acid or acetic anhydride circulating internally, are economically optimized, and the results show that both SRDC processes have a lower total annual cost (TAC) than the traditional two-column process. Furthermore, from the perspective of TAC, the application with an excess feed of butyric acid is better than the application with excess acetic anhydride. The developed technique may also be applied to retrofit other traditional two-column RD processes, where the overhead and bottom products are the lightest and heaviest components of the reaction system, respectively, and no azeotrope is involved in the RD column.
Highlights
Butyric anhydride is an important intermediate product, which is mainly used in the production of cellulose acetate butyrate, butyl butyryl lactate, and spices
T means bottom discharge is the mixture of excess butyric acid and butyric anhydride, which is fed into are fed into the reactive distillation (RD) column C1; the overhead discharge of C1 is acetic acid, while the bottom discharge distillation column
3, sensitivity-based optimization carried out toOn optimize the two applications of process, andpre-excess the resultsbutyric arewas shown in reboiler only represents the stripping sectioninof the single RD column (SRDC)
Summary
Butyric anhydride is an important intermediate product, which is mainly used in the production of cellulose acetate butyrate, butyl butyryl lactate, and spices. Continuous manufacturing processes have been introduced to produce fine chemicals, such as butyric anhydride, due to the numerous advantages over batch-wise manufacturing; these include lower capital and operating costs, improved controllability and product consistency, and lower environmental footprint [2,3,4]. A novel continuous process with a single RD column (SRDC) is proposed to produce butyric anhydride using the excess operation, where the second distillation column in the traditional. RD process for separating excess reactant is removed based on the analysis of the boiling point profile of the reaction system.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
