Distillation Design in Practice

All industrial distillation design of any consequence is now done using computer methods. Students need to be introduced to these new methods, shown the principles behind them, and taught how to use them more effectively and intelligently. This book is designed for use in a senior course in distillation design for the last undergraduate year or at postgraduate level. It is particularly useful for such a course because it integrates various disciplines (thermodynamics, design, control and distillation) that the student will have met separately in an earlier part of his course. The topics treated are: design, vapour/liquid equilibria data, binary distillation, multicomponent distillation, batch distillation, distillation systems, column internals, safety and control systems, pilot experiments and debottlenecking. Whereas most senior books on distillation concentrate on solution methods for the algebraic equations defining the separation in the column, this book concentrates on those areas which are the real concern of the distillation equipment designer.

The text provides a link between the theory of distillation and industrial practice. Industrial state-of-the-art distillation design is concerned with multi-component distillation and computer methods for their solution. Hence the book concentrates on computer solutions, i.e. how to use distillation packages and how to interpret the results. Sufficient computer exercises are presented to allow them to be used for a `CAD Workshop' type course, with 50% of course time being hands-on computer design of distillation systems. The appendix contains the program manuals and the source of all the necessary computer programs.