Yes / Although batch reactive distillation process outperforms traditional reactor-distillation processes due to simultaneous reaction and separation of products for many reaction systems, synthesis of Methyl lactate (ML) through esterification of lactic acid (LA) with methanol in such process is very challenging due to difficulty of keeping the reactants together when one of the reactants (in this case methanol) has the lowest boiling point than the reaction products. To overcome this challenge, two novel reactive distillation column configurations are proposed in this work and are investigated in detail. These are: (1) integrated conventional batch distillation column (i-CBD) with recycled methanol and (2) integrated semi-batch and conventional batch distillation columns (i-SBD) with methanol recovery and recycle. Performances of each of these configurations are evaluated in terms of profitability for a defined separation task. In i-SBD column, an additional constraint is included to avoid overflow of the reboiler due to continuous feeding of methanol into the reboiler as the reboiler is initially charged to its maximum capacity. This study clearly indicates that both integrated column configurations outperform the traditional column configurations (batch or semi-batch) in terms of batch time, energy consumption, conversion of LA to ML, and the achievable profit.

Yes / Methyl Decanoate (MeDC) is a Fatty Acid Methyl Ester (FAME) and is an important chemical compound with global production of 31 million tons per year. However, synthesis of methyl decanoate (MeDC) via esterification of Decanoic Acid (DeC) with methanol by reactive distillation is operationally challenging due to difficulty of keeping the reactants together in the reaction zone as methanol being the lightest component in the mixture can separate itself easily form the other reactant deteriorating significantly the conversion of DeC using either conventional batch or continuous distillation column. This is probably the main reason for not applying the conventional route for MeDC synthesis. Whether Semi-batch Distillation column (SBD) and the recently developed Integrated Conventional Batch Distillation column (i-CBD) offer the possibility of revisiting such chemical reactions for the synthesis of MeDC is the focus of this paper. The minimum energy consumption (Qtot) as the performance measure is used to evaluate the performances of each of these reactive column configurations for different range of methyl decanoate purity and the amount of product. It is observed that the use of i-CBD column provides much better performance than SBD column in terms of the production time and the maximum energy savings when excess methanol is used in the feed. However, the SBD column is found to perform better than the i-CBD column when both reactants in the feed are in equal amount. Also, the optimization results for a given separation task show that the performance of two-reflux intervals strategy is superior to the single-reflux interval in terms of operating batch time, and energy usage rate in the SBD process at equimolar ratio.

The synthesis of a number of alkyl esters such as methyl lactate, methyl decanoate, and ethyl benzoate via esterification in a reactive distillation is quite challenging. It is due to the complexity in the thermodynamic behaviour of the chemical species in the reaction mixture in addition to the difficulty of keeping the reactants together in the reaction section. One of the reactants (in these esterification reactions) having the lowest boiling point can separate from the other reactant as the distillation continues. This can result in a significant drop in the reaction conversion in a conventional reactive distillation whether it is a batch or a continuous column. To overcome this challenge, new different types of batch reactive distillation column configurations: (1) integrated conventional (2) semi-batch (3) integrated semi-batch (4) integrated dividing-wall batch distillation columns have been proposed here. Four esterification reaction schemes such as (a) esterification of lactic acid (b) esterification of decanoic acid (c) esterification of benzoic acid (d) esterification of acetic acid are investigated here. A detailed dynamic model based on mass, energy balances, chemical reaction, and rigorous thermodynamic (chemical and physical) properties is considered and incorporated in the optimisation framework within gPROMS (general PROcess Modelling System) software. It is found that for the methyl lactate system, the i-SBD operation outperforms the classical batch operations (CBD or SBD columns) to satisfy the product constraints. While, for the methyl decanoate system, the i-DWCBD operation outperforms all CBD, DWBD and sr-DWBD configurations by achieving the higher reaction conversion and the maximum product purity. For the ethyl benzoate system, the performance of i-CBD column is superior to the CBD process in terms of product quality, and conversion rate of acid. The CBD process is found to be a more attractive in terms of operating time saving, and annual profit improvement compared to the IBD, and MVD processes for the benzyl acetate system. / The Higher Committee for Education Development in Iraq (HCED)