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Non-Equilibrium Reactive Mole Fraction Curve Maps

Karla M. Rodriguez, Chemical Engineering, University of Puerto Rico Mayaguez, calle 17 c-2 #3 Rexville, Bayamon, PR 00957, Gerardo Ruiz, Chem Engg, UPR Mayaguez, PO Box 9046, UPRM, Mayaguez, PR 00681, and Lakshmi Sridhar, Chemical Engineering, University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez campus, P.O. Box 9046, Mayaguez, PR 00681.

Abstract

This investigation focuses on the distillation mole fraction curves that have been used in the design and synthesis of reactive and non-reactive separation processes. Based on deriving new expressions to calculate the non-equilibrium residue composition maps for reactive separation processes it incorporates mass transfer effects and design aspects. It also discusses the chosen strategy to solve the differential algebraic equation (DAE) system in order to find the non-equilibrium reactive mole fraction curves. It is shown that in the MTBE synthesis problem, the stationary reactive points calculated by equilibrium and non-equilibrium approaches do not coincide for reactive saddle-point azeotrope.