Reactive distillation has been proposed as a means of enhancing the conversion for reactions whose progress is limited by chemical equilibrium. In the present work, reactive distillation tests were carried out for the hydration of isoamylene (2-methyl-2-butene) to 2-methyl-2-butanol (tert-amyl alcohol or TAA) in a 5.3-cm column using a bale-type catalytic packing. Acetone was used as a solvent to avoid formation of a second liquid phase and also to enhance the rate of reaction. The experimental results showed TAA yields approaching 100% when the distillate stream from the top of the column was essentially suppressed. This yield is more than double that possible thermodynamically in a separate reactor. It was also found that an excess of catalytic packing can generate operational problems. The column was simulated using an equilibrium stage model together with the kinetic expression developed for this reaction and reported in Part 1 of this paper. The simulation and the experimental results matched reasonably well. Model results indicate that the TAA yield can be greater than 95% (at a pressure of 240 kPa) when the weight hour space velocity is lower than 30 kg/(h‚kg). A parametric study elucidated the effect of varying the feed composition and key operating variables.
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