A New Intensified Heat Integration in Distillation Column

In this contribution, a new intensified energy integration technique is introduced for the distillation column. The influence of the proposed intensified heat-integrated distillation column (int-HIDiC) scheme on the energetic and economic aspects is evaluated through intensive comparison against the heat-integrated distillation column (HIDiC) and the conventional stand-alone column. The HIDiC and the conventional distillation column (CDiC) are conceptually designed by the minimization of total annual cost (TAC). Here, two int-HIDiC structures are developed by introducing further thermal coupling between the overhead vapor of rectifying section and the bottom liquid of stripping section of the HIDiC scheme. This intensified energy integration approach reduces the steam consumption in the reboiler and avoids the use of a trim-condenser. For a binary distillation, it is observed that the proposed int-HIDiCs provide positive energy savings and better economic figures than the HIDiC and the conventional column.