CO2 Utilization Feasibility Study: Dimethyl Carbonate Direct Synthesis Process with Dehydration Reactive Distillation

The urge to mitigate the greenhouse effect has risen in recent years. Other than CO2 capture and storage technology, research for CO2 utilization is also crucial. Among the candidate compounds of CO2 conversion, dimethyl carbonate (DMC) is one of the most promising material since it has a variety of usage. Converting CO2 to other components is often challenging because of its stable chemical property. However, in this work, processes with intensified configuration were proposed to enhance the economic feasibility. A conventional process and three intensified processes were developed and optimized in Aspen Plus. Economic and environmental evaluations were conducted by calculating total annual cost (TAC) and CO2 net emission amount. The results indicated that processes using ethylene oxide (EO) as dehydrating agent and an intensified configuration including a column with a side reactor (RDSR-HI and RDSRT processes) could save up to more than 88% of TAC compared to the conventional process. Moreover, those d...