Separation of azeotropic mixture using multi-stage ultrasound-assisted flash distillation

• Main Authors: Mahdi, Taha H., Ahmad, Arshad, Ripin, Adnan, Nasef, Mohamed Mahmoud
• Format: Article
• Published: Berkeley Electronic Press 2015
• Subjects: TP Chemical technology
• Online Access: http://eprints.utm.my/id/eprint/55427/; http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/cppm-2015-0003

A mathematical model for an ultrasound-assisted vapor liquid equilibrium (VLE) system developed in Aspen Custom Modeler is exported to Aspen Plus flowsheeting environment to form a block in the software library to represent a single stage flash separation unit. The block is then arranged in series to mimic an ultrasonically intensified distillation process. As a case study, an ethanol/ethyl acetate separation process is examined. The results show that a 99 mol% ethyl acetate recovery is established when a series of 27 flash VLE devices are used. The system is also evaluated for other minimum boiling azeotropic mixtures, and consistent results are obtained, thus revealing the potentials of ultrasound-assisted system as an alternative strategy for azeotropic mixture separations.