CHE333

Simultaneous Heat & Mass

Transfer Operations

Lecture 7: Distillation
Dr. Abdul Razzaq
Assistant professor, CUI Lahore.

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 Recap
➢ Distillation and its types

➢ Partial vaporization and partial condensation

➢ Rectifying and stripping section

➢ Liquid reflux

➢ Basic laws, Volatility and relative volatility

➢ Vapor liquid equilibrium

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 Contents
➢ Vapor liquid equilibrium, x-y, T-x-y and H-x-y diagrams
➢ Operating equations development for number of trays calculation
➢ q-line
➢ Reflux ratio, minimum reflux ratio, Total Reflux ratio
➢ Plate efficiency

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 Vapor Liquid Equilibrium

➢ At constant pressure
• Bubble point curve
(T vs. x)
• Dew point curve
(T vs. y)
 Vapor Liquid Equilibrium
Partial Vaporization and Partial Condensations:

Liquid to
Vapor ratio?

Fig: Effect of partial vaporization and condensation at the boiling point

 Vapor Liquid Equilibrium
Partial Vaporization and Partial Condensations:
➢ Curve ABCJ is the boiling point curve

➢ Curve ADEJ shows the temperature at which a vapor of composition y

starts to condense.

➢ Consider a mixture of composition x2 at a temperature T3, upon heating

the following changes will occur:

✓ At temp T2, liquid will boil and vapors with composition y2 are formed.

✓ On further heating the composition of the liquid will change cause of the
loss of more volatile component to the vapor

✓ On further heating to a temperature T1, all of the liquid is vaporized to

give vapor D of the same composition y1 as the original liquid.
 Vapor Liquid Equilibrium
Partial Vaporization and Partial Condensations:
➢ Partial vaporization of the liquid gives a vapor richer in the more volatile
component than the liquid.

➢ Starting with superheated vapor represented by point H, on cooling to D

condensation commences, and the first drop of liquid has a composition
K.
 Binary distillation
➢ In order to develop a method for the design of distillation units it is
necessary to develop an analytical approach for

• Number of trays to be calculated

• Heat and material flows over the trays, the condenser, and the reboiler must be
established

• Thermodynamic data for how much mass transfer is needed to establish

equilibrium between the streams leaving each tray

• Required diameter of the column to accommodate the desired flowrates and to

operate within the available drop in pressure

• The desired degree of mixing of the streams on each tray

 Distillation: Heat Balance
➢ Four streams are involved in the transfer of heat and
material across a plate

➢ The action of the plate is to bring about mixing so that

the vapour Vn, of composition yn, approaches
equilibrium with the liquid Ln, of composition xn
➢ The streams Ln+1 and Vn−1 cannot be in equilibrium and,
during the interchange process on the plate, some of the
more volatile component is vaporised from the liquid
Ln+1, decreasing its concentration to xn, and some of the
less volatile component is condensed from Vn−1,
increasing the vapour concentration to yn
 Distillation
➢ Assumptions conditions for calculation

• Heat losses small and neglected, Ideal case the heat of mixing is zero

• Molar heat of vaporization, constant (Independent of composition)

• One mole of Vn-1 liberates one mole of Vn (Vn=Vn-1), unless changes done

• Temperature change form one plate to another plate is small thus Hn+1 =

Hn

• Vn and Ln constant over the Rectifying section

• Vm an Lm are constant over the Stripping section

 Distillation: TOE, TOL
➢ Material balance above plate ‘n’

➢ Balance for more volatile component gives

➢ The above equation relates the

compositions of vapors rising to the plate to
the composition of liquid on any plate above
the feed plate.
➢ Since the molar liquid overflow is constant,
then
 Distillation: BOE, BOL
➢Similarly, taking a material balance for
the total streams and for the more volatile
component from the bottom to above
plate ‘m’

➢This eq gives the corresponding relation

b/w the composition of vapor rising to a
plate and the liquid on the plate for the
section below the feed plate.
Intersection of operating lines: q-line

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Intersection of operating lines: q-line

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 Intersection of operating lines: q-line
• The locus of the point of intersection of the operating lines is of considerable
importance and is dependent on the temperature and physical condition of the
feed

• This equation is commonly known as the equation of the q-line

• The line may thus be drawn through two easily determined points

• From the definition of q, it follows that the slope of the q-line is governed by the
nature of the feed as follows

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Reflux ratio

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 Reflux ratio
✓ Reflux is altered, TOL is altered, hence number of plates
required varies

✓ If D = 0, under condition of total reflux R is infinity and

slope is 1

✓ TOL can be drawn between (xd,xd) and (0, xd/R+1)

✓ If reflux is reduced more stages are required to achieve

purity

✓ Further reduction of R will bring line to AE and infinite

number of stages is required from xd to xf

✓ Such condition is known as minimum reflux ration Rm

✓ A small increase in R beyond Rm will give a workable

system

✓ Line AG gives an impossible condition as couldn’t reach

xf 17
 Calculation of Minimum Reflux ratio
✓ Consider the conditions where q-line is vertical:

✓ Point E lies on equilibrium curve and has coordinates (xf, yf)

✓ The slope of the line AE is given by:

 Calculation of Minimum Reflux ratio
✓ Consider the conditions where q-line is horizontal:

✓ The enrichment line for minimum reflux is given by AC, where Point C
has coordinates (xc, yc)
 Calculation of Minimum Reflux
➢ Underwood and Fenske Equation

✓ For ideal mixtures or where relative volatility may be taken as constant,

Minimum reflux ratio may be calculated by using Fenske’s equation
 Plates at total reflux: Fenske’s method
✓ Fenske derived an equation for calculating the required number of
plates

✓ n is the required number of theoretical plates in the column

 Selection of Economic Reflux ratio
✓ The cost of distillation column includes:
a. Capital or fixed cost (such as those for purchase of distillation column, internals,
reboiler, condenser and other equipment)

b. Operating cost (such as utilities like condenser cooling water, reboiler steam etc)

✓ The steam required will be proportional to Vm, which may be taken as

Vn where the feed is liquid at its boiling point.

✓ From a material balance over the top portion of the column, Vn =D(R +
1) and hence the steam required per mole of the product is proportional
to R + 1.
 Selection of Economic Reflux ratio
✓ The cost of the distillation column generally includes capital cost, operating cost and
depreciation cost

✓ There is no general relationship, however commonly practice displays it is usually 1.1-

1.5 times the minimum value
 Selection of Economic Reflux ratio
✓Increasing the reflux ratio from Rm therefore affects
the capital and operating costs of a column as follows:
a) The operating costs rise and are approximately
proportional to (R + 1)
b) The capital cost initially falls since the number of
plates falls off rapidly at this stage
c) The capital cost rises at high values of R, since
there is then only a very small reduction in the
number of plates, although the diameter, and hence
the area, continuously increases because the vapor
load becomes greater. The associated condenser and
reboiler will also be larger and hence more
expensive
 Murphree Plate Efficiency
✓ Theoretical, Ideal and Real plates
✓The ratio n/np of the number of ideal stages to the number of actual
trays represents the overall efficiency E of the column, which may be
30–100 percent
✓The proportion of liquid and vapour, and the physical properties of
the mixtures on the trays, will vary up the column, and conditions on
individual trays must be examined, as suggested by MURPHREE
 Murphree Plate Efficiency
✓For a single ideal tray, the vapour leaving is in equilibrium with the
liquid leaving, and the ratio of the actual change in composition
achieved to that which would occur if equilibrium between
yn and xn were attained is known as the Murphree plate efficiency EM
 Thank You
for
Your Attention
email:
abdulrazzaq@cuilahore.edu.pk

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