In industry, chemical engineers are often enlisted to retrofit equipment and/or modify operations to achieve increased production capacity, increased product purity and/or improved energy efficiency. In undergraduate chemical engineering separations courses, the focus is on stand-alone separation processes such as distillation, gas absorption/stripping, and extraction. At some universities, membrane-based processes are included in the traditional separations course. It may often be advantageous to couple two separation processes to achieve a superior separation sequence in terms of operating costs and/or capital expenditures. Separation of an azeotropic mixture using distillation alone requires the introduction of an extractive solvent or an entrainer, either of which much be recovered and recycled. The benefits of hybridization in separations are realized for the separation of azeotropic mixtures using distillation and pervaporation. An instructional module on hybrid separations was developed for incorporation into the undergraduate separations course.
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