Separating Binary Azeotropes Using Pressure Swing Distillation

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Pressure swing distillation (PSD) is a complex distillation technique in which two distillation columns, one operating at low pressure and the other at high pressure, are used to separate homogeneous azeotropic mixtures. For a successful separation, it is necessary that the azeotrope compositions at the high and low pressures be sufficiently different. This Demonstration considers a binary mixture of acetonitrile and water. This mixture is a good candidate for PSD because it exhibits a pressure-sensitive minimum-boiling azeotrope [1, 2].
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Contributed by: Housam Binous and Brian G. Higgins (September 2012)
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
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References
[1] J.-U. Repke and A. Klein, "Homogeneous Azeotropic Pressure Swing Distillation: Continuous and Batch Process," Computer Aided Chemical Engineering, 20, 2005 pp. 721–726. doi:10.1016/S1570-7946(05)80242-1.
[2] J. P. Knapp and M. F. Doherty, "A New Pressure-Swing-Distillation Process for Separating Homogeneous Azeotropic Mixtures," Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, 31(1), 1992 pp. 346–357. doi:10.1021/ie00001a047.
Permanent Citation
"Separating Binary Azeotropes Using Pressure Swing Distillation"
http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/SeparatingBinaryAzeotropesUsingPressureSwingDistillation/
Wolfram Demonstrations Project
Published: September 21 2012