Design and Optimization of Azeotropic and Extractive Distillation to Purify Furfural Considering Safety, Environmental and Economic Issues.

Abstract In this work have been designed and optimized simultaneously three different process separations for purify furfural, using Differential Evolution with Tabu List Algorithm. The study cases are a conventional Quaker Oats process, a thermally coupled process and liquid-liquid extraction process. The objective of this work is select the best alternative to purify furfural taken into consideration economic, environmental and safety issues. The results show which the thermally coupled process has several improvements and reductions on the risk, similar cost and environmental impact compared with Quaker Oats process. While the liquid-liquid extraction process does not have any improvement in the objective function, these results are associated with the use of entrainer in this sequence with respect to Quaker Oats Process. Therefore, due to the important improvements in safety issues the TCP process is choosing as the best alternative.