ABSTRACT
A mixture of ethanol, isopropanol and methyl ethyl ketone is widely used as solvent. But after separation, it becomes difficult to separate these solvents from the mixture because these three solvents form azeotropic mixtures with very close boiling points, with a maximum temperature difference of about 4 °C. These solvents are expensive and are not disposed-off as waste. In addition, disposal of these solvents pollutes the environment. Therefore, there is a need for effective recovery of these solvents. Conventional distillation techniques cannot be used for their effective separation. In the present study, the PSD was used to separate these solvents using DWSIM version 6.6.2 and then the process was optimized to investigate its economic feasibility. The result showed that IPA-MEK-EtOH was the more cost-effective separation sequence compared to MEK-IPA-EtOH. In addition, the feasibility study of the process produced 2.689 years as payback period.
