Recovery of N‐Butanol from a Complex Five‐Component Reactive Azeotropic Mixture

Abstract

This paper proposes a concept of a process design for the separation and recovery of n‐ butanol from a five‐component mixture, consisting of n‐butanol, isobutanol, formaldehyde, water and methanol. The mixture is a common waste stream in the production of butylated amino resins; therefore, recovery of n‐butanol is crucial to the efficiency of the process. The results show that up to 94% of the n‐butanol present in the waste stream can be recovered. Under the studied conditions, 99.76% pure n‐butanol can be obtained, while formaldehyde, water and methanol are present only in traces. The energy intensity of the process is estimated at 2.42 MJ/kg of purified n‐butanol. The economic analysis of the process shows that the process is economically viable over a wide range of production capacities, as evidenced by high net present values and high return on investment values.