The esterification of acetic acid with ethanol in a pervaporation membrane reactor

Pervaporation membrane reactors are the systems in which the separation and reaction are carried out simultaneously in order to increase conversions by removing one or more of the products formed during equilibrium reactions. In this study the esterification reaction of acetic acid and ethanol to produce ethyl acetate and water was investigated using a batch pervaporation membrane reactor. The experiments were carried out in the temperature range of 50-70°C. The ratios of ethanol concentration to acetic acid concentration were chosen as 1 and 1.5. Amberlyst 15 and sulfuric acid were used as the catalysts. Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) prepared in our labs was used as the membrane material, permselective to ethyl acetate formed by reaction. In this way, conversions were increased by continuous removal of ethyl acetate from the reaction media. Conversions are found to increase with an increase in both molar ratios of reactants and temperature. Temperature has a strong influence on the performance of the pervaporation membrane reactor because it acts on both the esterification kinetics and pervaporation.