Design of reactive distillation units: a new sequential approach

A general methodology for the pre-design of reactive distillation columns undergoing one equilibrium reaction is presented in this paper. First, an analysis of various approaches existing in the literature is explained. Then, a progressive procedure that combines the advantages of the Static Analysis (SA) and the Boundary Value Design method (BVD) is proposed. With this procedure, it is easy to get the main parameters to design the process (reflux ratio, feed location and composition, number of stages, location and length of the reactive zone). The procedure is successfully applied to the production of Methyl-tert-Butyl-Ether (MTBE) and the simulation of the designed configuration via an equilibrium stage column model confirms its reliability.