Simulation of Ethyl Tert-Butyl Ether Production from Tert-Butyl Alcohol and Ethanol in Reactive Distillation

  • Suttichai Assabumrungrat Center of Excellence in Catalysis and Catalytic Reaction Engineering, Department of Chemical engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University
  • Varong Pavarajarn Center of Excellence in Catalysis and Catalytic Reaction Engineering, Department of Chemical engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University
  • Darin Wongwattanasate Center of Excellence in Catalysis and Catalytic Reaction Engineering, Department of Chemical engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University
  • Piyasan Praserthdam Center of Excellence in Catalysis and Catalytic Reaction Engineering, Department of Chemical engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University
Keywords: B-zeolite, thyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) synthesis, reactive distillation

Abstract

Reactive distillation was applied for the synthesis of ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) from a liquid-phase reaction between tert-butyl alcohol (TBA) and ethanol (EtOH) catalyzed by commercial ~-zeolite catalyst with Si/AI ratio of 55. The major side reaction of this system was the dehydration of TBA to isobutene (lB). From the present researchers' previous work, it was found that B-zeolite was superior to commercial Amberlyst-15 catalyst in reaction selectivity. The kinetic parameters for the reactions, which were determined using a semibatch reactor operated at various temperatures, were used for simulation in Aspen Plus TN program. Various operating parameters, such as heat duty, molar ratio of Hz0: EtOH, and refluxratio, were investigatedfor their effectson reactive distillation performance. Keywords: ,B-zeolite,ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) synthesis, and reactive distillation.

References

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Published
2005-12-31
How to Cite
Assabumrungrat, S., Pavarajarn, V., Wongwattanasate, D., & Praserthdam, P. (2005). Simulation of Ethyl Tert-Butyl Ether Production from Tert-Butyl Alcohol and Ethanol in Reactive Distillation. ASEAN Journal of Chemical Engineering, 5(1), 16-21. Retrieved from https://journal.ugm.ac.id/v3/AJChE/article/view/7629
Section
Articles