Novel Hybrid Reactive Distillation with Extraction and Distillation Processes for Furfural Production from an Actual Xylose Solution

Abstract

Furfural is only derived from lignocellulosic biomass and is an important chemical used in the plastics, agrochemical, and pharmaceutical industries. The existing industrial furfural production process, involving reaction and purification steps, suffers from a low yield and intensive energy use. Hence, major improvements are needed to sustainably upgrade the furfural production process. In this study, the conventional furfural process based on a continuous stirred tank reactor and distillation columns was designed and optimized from an actual aqueous xylose solution via a biomass pretreatment step. Subsequently, a reactive distillation (RD) and extraction/distillation (ED) configuration was proposed for the reaction and purification steps, respectively, to improve the process efficiency. RD can remove furfural instantly from the reactive liquid phase and can separate heavy components from the raw furfural stream, while the ED configuration with toluene and butyl chloride used as extracting solvents can effectively separate furfural from a dilute aqueous stream. The results showed that the hybrid RD-ED process using a butyl chloride solvent saves up to 51.8% and 57.4% of the total investment costs and total annual costs, respectively, compared to the conventional process. Furthermore, environmental impacts were evaluated and compared for all structural alternatives.

Novel Heat-Integrated Hybrid Distillation and Adsorption Process for Coproduction of Cellulosic Ethanol, Heat, and Electricity from Actual Lignocellulosic Fermentation Broth

“…In this study, the CE plant was designed with a capacity of 120 ktpy of CE based on processes reported previously [10,16,22]. A conventional process for the coproduction of CE, heat, and electricity was designed and operating conditions were optimized.…”

“…The process coproduces CE and furfural, and the concept was initially proposed by Strømsnes et al [16]. In a previous study, a novel reactive distillation with an extraction-distillation configuration was proposed to improve the furfural production process [22]. In the present study, a cost-effective design for the coproduction of CE and electricity from a lignocellulosic fermentation broth (Figure 1, inside the dashed line rectangle) was developed.…”

“…The broth comprises a number of components, including CE, water, gas (CO 2 ), soluble solids, and insoluble solids. A conventional process was designed based on processes reported previously [10,16,22]. Figure 1 shows a schematic flowsheet of the integrated process for coproduction of CE, furfural, heat, and electricity from lignocellulosic feedstock.…”

Pressure Swing-Based Reactive Distillation and Dividing Wall Column for Improving Manufacture of Propylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether Acetate

“…Among various methods that have been developed for improving distillation column performance, PI and heat integration (HI) are considered as proven methods in academia and the industrial sector [8][9][10][11][12]. Interestingly, PI has been extensively used to improve the energy efficiency and cost reduction of chemical and distillation processes [2,4,[13][14][15][16][17] and can achieve a sustainable chemical process of the reactive-pressure swing with inherent Among various methods that have been developed for improving distillation column performance, PI and heat integration (HI) are considered as proven methods in academia and the industrial sector [8][9][10][11][12]. Interestingly, PI has been extensively used to improve the energy efficiency and cost reduction of chemical and distillation processes [2,4,[13][14][15][16][17] and can achieve a sustainable chemical process of the reactive-pressure swing with inherent advantages of safety, environment, and economics [18].…”

“…Interestingly, PI has been extensively used to improve the energy efficiency and cost reduction of chemical and distillation processes [2,4,[13][14][15][16][17] and can achieve a sustainable chemical process of the reactive-pressure swing with inherent Among various methods that have been developed for improving distillation column performance, PI and heat integration (HI) are considered as proven methods in academia and the industrial sector [8][9][10][11][12]. Interestingly, PI has been extensively used to improve the energy efficiency and cost reduction of chemical and distillation processes [2,4,[13][14][15][16][17] and can achieve a sustainable chemical process of the reactive-pressure swing with inherent advantages of safety, environment, and economics [18]. A dividing wall column (DWC) [19,20], which allows compacting two-column and avoiding unnecessary energy waste due to remixing in the split, is one of the best examples of PI.…”