Minor Project Report

On
SIMULATION OF ESTERIFICATION REACTION USING GIBBS
REACTOR IN ASPEN PLUS

Subject: Chemical reaction engineering

Submitted to

Department of Chemical Engineering

By
M.VAASANTHI _ 171FA02010

Under the Supervision Of

Dr.M. RAMESH NAIDU

Chemical Department, Vignan’s Foundation for

Science, Technology and Research.
 CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the Minor Project Report entitled:SIMULATION

OF ESTERIFICATION REACTION USING GIBBS REACTOR IN ASPEN
PLUS submitted by Ms. M.VAASANTHI (171FA02010) to the VIGNAN’S
FOUNDATION FOR SCIENCE TECHNOLOGY & RESEARCH, VADLAMUDI
towards partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the Degree
of Bachelor of Technology in Chemicals Engineering is a bonafide record of
the work carried out by them under my supervision and guidance.

Mr.Dr.M.Ramesh Naidu ,
HOD, Associate Professor,
Department of Chemical Engineering,
VFSTR, Vadlamudi

Signature Of Head of the Department

AIM : simulate the process and compute the compound mole fraction in the liquid
product and the vent stream.

THEORY :
The abbrevation of ASPEN is “Advanced system for process engineering”. ASPEN is
a process simulation software package widely used in industry today. Given a process
design and an appropriate selection of thermodynamic models, ASPEN
uses mathematical models to predict the performance of the process. This information
can then be used in an iterative fashion to optimize the design.

Esterification reepresents one of the most important reaction in chemical industry and
the ester produced have application in variety of areas such as plasticizer, flavours and
fragrances, pesticides, solvents, medical and surface activity agent.

The production of ethyl acetate by esterification of acetic acid with ethanol can be
described by the following equation:

CH3COOH + C2H5OH ------------------------> C2H5COOCH3 + H2O

The reaction proceeds slowly at room temperature involving about 65 % of the

reactants. The reaction rate can be accelerated by the addition of acidic catalysts.
Furthermore, the equilibrium is shifted strongly to the right through the resulting
water removal from the system.

The industrial process flow diagram of ethyl acetate

PROBLEM STATMENT :
Ethyl acetate is produced in an esterification reaction between acetic acid and ethyl
alcohol.

CH3COOH + C2H5OH ------------------------> C2H5COOCH3 + H2O

The feed mixture consisting of 52.5 mole% of acetic acid, 45 mole% of ethyl alcohol
and 2.5 mole% of water, enters the RGIBBS with the flow rate of 400kmol/hr at 75 0C
and 1.1 atm. The reactor operates at 700C and 1 atm. Both the reactions are first order
with respective each of the reactants i.e( overall second order) for these liquid phase
reactions the kinetic date for the arrhenius law are as follows:

Forward reaction : k = 2*108 m3/kmol

E = 6*107 j/kmol

Reverse reaction: k = 5*107 m3/kmol

E = 6*107 j/kmol

Perform the ASPEN Plus simulation using the NRTL thermodynamic model.

PROCEDURE :
1. Select the ASPEN PLUS user interface software and select open blank simulation.

2. Select DATA and then click on SET UP.

Accounting step place a major role in simulation, without accounting the simulation
can not run.

3. The next step is to enter the components entering into the reactor.

4. The next step is to setup the base method used for thermodynamic process. The
base method used is NRTL method.
5. Later draw the flow sheet

6. Enter the stream parameters such as temperature , pressure, total mole flow rate and
mole fraction of each component.

7. Enter the operating conditions of the reactor such as temperature, pressure.

8. Write the reaction taking place inside the reactor and its arrhenius parameters such
as pre-exponential factor, activation energy.
9. Run the simulation and the processing takes place.

10. The results are obtained.

RESULTS :
The mole fractions of acetic acid, ethanol, ethyl acetate, water are

S.no COMPONENT LIQUID MOLE VAPOUR MOLE

FRACTION FRACTION
1 Acetic acid 0.5250000 0.525
2 Ethanol 0 1.85535E-4
3 Ethyl acetate 0.45 0.4498145
4 Water 0.025 00248144