Separation of Ethyl Acetate and Ethanol Azeotropic System by Acetate-Based Ionic Liquid

Abstract

Three ionic liquids (ILs)(1-ethyl-2,3-dimethylimidazolium acetate, [EMMIM][AC]; tributylmethylammonium acetate, [N4,4,4,1][AC]; and tetraethylammonium acetate, [N2,2,2,2][AC]) were chosen. The vapor-liquid equilibrium (VLE) data of ternary mixtures (acetate + ethanol + IL) were gauged at 101.3KPa. NRTL equation was applied to correlate the data. From NRTL model, for [N2,2,2,2][AC], [EMMIM][AC] and [N4,4,4,1][AC], minimum mole fractions for completely eliminating azeotrope are 0.015, 0.020 and 0.022, respectively. From the average relative volatility and σ-profiles, it can be obtained that the separation ability order is [EMMIM][AC] > [N2,2,2,2][AC] > [N4,4,4,1][AC].