The partial heat-integrated pressure-swing reactive distillation process for transesterification of methyl acetate with isopropanol

A novel partial heat-integrated pressure-swing reactive distillation process is designed for the transesterification reaction of methyl acetate and isopropanol. Aspen Plus is used to investigate the steady state for obtaining the optimal configurations of the processes. The partial heat-integrated pressure-swing reactive distillation process can save 33.41% energy consumption and 27.16% total TAC in comparison with conventional reactive distillation process. The basic and improved control structures for the partial heat-integrated pressure-swing reactive distillation process are studied using Aspen Dynamic. The improved control structure can deal with the feed disturbances very well and maintain product purities with acceptable transient deviations and settling times.