Economic and environmental impact assessment of extractive distillation with renewable entrainers for reprocessing aqueous 2-Propanol

Abstract Recently, in manufacturing industries innovative green and smart designs are being proposed that considers the minimal and efficient usage of resources including materials, energy, and effort which are environmentally safe. Accordingly, an enhanced purification methodology, extractive distillation (ED) has been investigated for the reprocessing of 2-Propanol (IPA) with three renewable entrainers viz. conventional solvent: glycerol, saline entrainer: glycerol + MgCl2 and deep eutectic solvent (DES): choline chloride-glycerol based on the exponential surge in the production of glycerol over the past decade. The systematic assessment of the three processes includes investigating the experimental feasibility observed through phase equilibrium studies, thermodynamic modeling followed by process design and optimization. A sequential strategy defining desired objectives has been used for the parametric optimization with the key performance indicators including Total Annual Cost (TAC), Specific Energy Consumption (SEC), entrainer quantity and CO2 emissions to comprehend the overall efficiency of each process. The results revealed that the saline entrainer based ED process as most reliable with substantial reduction of 32.5% and 21.4% in TAC together with 33.9% and 24.1% decline in the SEC and 34.2% and 24.4% lower CO2 emissions compared to the conventional and DES based processes respectively.