Distillation-Pervaporation Hybrid Process for Ethanol Dehydration: Process Optimization and Economic Evaluation

Abstract

To achieve energy-efficient ethanol-water separation, a hybrid distillation-pervaporation process was investigated. First, a mathematical model was developed in Aspen Custom Modeler. Then, four energy-saving configurations were designed: distillation-pervaporation (D-PV), heat pump-assisted distillation-pervaporation (HPD-PV), heat pump-heat integration-assisted distillation-pervaporation (HPD-HENs-PV), and modified ethanol mass fraction distillation-pervaporation (ZHPD-HENs-PV). A multiobjective genetic algorithm was applied for optimization. The results demonstrated that compared to azeotropic distillation (AD), the total energy consumption (TEC) of these processes was significantly reduced, while the total annual cost (TAC) was also substantially decreased.