Efficient Feed Preheat Targeting for Distillation by Feed Splitting

摘要

Thermal condition of the feed may be altered to reduce the reboiler duty. However, only a portion of the thermal energy given to the feed reduces the reboiler duty. By splitting the feed and altering the thermal condition of a part of the feed, it is possible to achieve reduction only in the reboiler duty (100% preheat efficiency). Based on the thermodynamic analysis of a distillation column, a methodology is developed to target split fraction of the feed for preheating to obtain reduction only in the reboiler duty.