Simple Batch Distillation of an Ethanol-Water Mixture

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An equimolar binary mixture of ethanol and water is to be separated in a still pot, which initially contains 0.575 kmol of the mixture. You can set the operating pressure, , of this simple batch distillation experiment, where
can vary from 700 to 900 mmHg so that the ideal gas-phase assumption holds.
Contributed by: Housam Binous, Mamdouh Al-Harthi, and Brian G. Higgins (December 2011)
Open content licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
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With the simple experimental apparatus shown below, one can obtain the temperature in the still pot, , and that of the escaping vapor,
. Since the system is a binary mixture, the composition
in the still pot can be inferred from the temperature measurement
obtained using a thermocouple with digital display.
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