The synthesis of partially thermally coupled column configurations for a multicomponent distillation has been studied in the context of the thermodynamic equivalent structures. There has been formulated a complete space of the possible thermodynamic equivalent alternatives of the partially coupled (PC) configurations for multicomponent mixtures. A formula is presented to calculate the number of all the partially coupled schemes for any n-component mixture. The formulated alternatives of all the possible arrangements of PC configurations provide a complete subspace for optimal design of multicomponent distillation systems not only for the economics, but also for column equipment designs.
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