Design and optimization for the separation of tetrahydrofuran/isopropanol/water using heat pump assisted heat-integrated extractive distillation

Abstract This study is focused on the separation for the ternary mixture of isopropanol/tetrahydrofuran/water with extractive distillation method, including indirect extractive distillation and direct extractive distillation. Dimethyl sulfoxide is selected to be the optimal solvent in the separation process through COSMO-SAC model and relative volatility. The vapor recompressed heat pump technology and heat integration are introduced for further energy saving. The energetic, economic, environment and exergy evaluation are utilized to estimate the performance of the proposed processes. The direct extractive distillation tends to be better than indirect extractive distillation. The double-heat pump assisted direct extractive distillation with heat integration shows the best performance in energy conservation and reducing cost, which achieve a reduction on energy consumption and total cost by 64.97% and 34.26% respectively compared to the direct extractive distillation process.