Design and Control of Entrainer-Added Reactive Distillation for Fatty Ester Production

Substantial energy reduction and high-purity isopropyl palmitate can be obtained by using an entrainer-added reactive distillation process. A special case of input multiplicity, in which a set of design specifications can be achieved by an infinite but bounded set of operating conditions, is found. Plantwide dynamics show that entrainer inventory in the reactive distillation column is self-regulatory, provided that the organic phase liquid level is controlled without offset. A simple plantwide control scheme with three temperature control loops, PI decanter level control, and conventional level control in the reboiler will be sufficient to maintain purities of the fatty ester and water products.