chemical engineering research and design 8 7 ( 2 0 0 9 ) 16491657

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Chemical Engineering Research and Design

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cherd

Energy saving and capital cost evaluation in distillation column sequences with a divided wall column
Massimiliano Errico a, , Giuseppe Tola a , Ben-Guang Rong b , Daniele Demurtas a , Ilkka Turunen c
Universit degli Studi di Cagliari, Dipartimento di Ingegneria Chimica e Materiali, P.zza DArmi sn, I-09123 Cagliari, Italy University of Southern Denmark, Institute of Chemical Engineering, Biotechnology and Environmental Technology, DK-5230 Odense M, Denmark c Lappeenranta University of Technology, Department of Chemical Technology, P.O. Box 20, FIN-53851 Lappeenranta, Finland
b a

a b s t r a c t
The divided wall column (DWC) to separate three components in a single distillation tower is receiving increasing interest in industrial applications due to the potentiality in energy and capital cost savings. In this work, the DWC congurations for the separation of a four components mixture was considered, and 5 different composition cases were analyzed. After selecting the best simple column (SC) sequence, the hybrid structures obtained by considering a conguration with a DWC replacing the rst or the last two SCs of the sequence are considered. To simulate the DWCs a short-cut code was used to get the input data necessary to initialize the rigorous simulations. The results obtained for the hybrid structures were compared with the performance of the best SC sequence from which are derived to evaluate energy and capital cost savings. The Petlyuk and the DWC structures were considered independently in the capital cost evaluation to select the most convenient conguration. A signicant energy reduction was achieved with DWC structures, while the saving in capital costs is lower than the 30% value reported in most of the specialized literature. 2009 The Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Divided wall column; Petlyuk column; Multicomponent distillation; Fully thermally coupled structure

1.

Introduction

Distillation is considered, by far, the prevalent method for separating uid mixtures in the chemical and petrochemical industry. Despite its huge diffusion this method has the drawback of the high energy consumption. After the energy crisis and with the introduction of more strict environmental regulations, the necessity to dene more energy efcient structures becomes the rst step in the choice of the design alternatives. Many studies in the last decades focused on the problem of the best separation sequence for a given multicomponent mixture, from the analysis of the space including all the SC congurations (Thompson and King, 1972) to new distillation column arrangements recently proposed (Rong and Turunen, 2006). Among all the possibilities, the thermal coupling technique is considered as the most promising strategy to reach

the scope of energy reduction in both design and retrot cases (Calzon-McConville et al., 2006; Errico et al., 2008). It is well known that the thermal coupling is realized by the substitution of a condenser and/or a reboiler with a two-way liquid and vapour interconnecting streams between the distillation columns. In the case where all the possible thermal couplings are introduced at the same time and the separation is carried out by employing only one condenser and one reboiler, the structure is called fully thermally coupled conguration or Petlyuk column (Agrawal, 2000; Petlyuk et al., 1965). Completely thermal coupling structures were initially patented in the rst half of the XX century by different authors (Brugma, 1942; Wright, 1949) and then reconsidered from the point of view of the reduction of the thermodynamic losses related to the separation technique (Petlyuk et al., 1965). The Petlyuk conguration for a 3 component separation is reported

Corresponding author. Tel.: +39 070 675 5061; fax: +39 070 675 5067. E-mail address: m.errico@dicm.unica.it (M. Errico). Received 28 October 2008; Received in revised form 18 May 2009; Accepted 20 May 2009 0263-8762/$ see front matter 2009 The Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.cherd.2009.05.006

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Nomenclature A b C C C d D DD DI E F f G G I ID m N n P Q q R r S V V Y Subscript 1, 2, 3 a b A, B, C c f L m P r TC V w heat exchanger area [m2 ] bottom component owrate [kmol/h] annual incremental unit investment cost [$/m2 yr] annual incremental unit investment cost in condenser and reboiler equipment [$/m2 yr] cost of steam and coolant to vaporize and condense respectively 1 kmole of distillate [$/kmol] distillate component owrate [kmol/h] direct structure column diameter [m] directindirect structure fractional plate efciency feed owrate [kmol/h] feed component owrate [kmol/h] allowable vapour velocity [kmol/h m2 ] vapour-handling capacity of condenser and reboiler equipment combined [kmol/h m2 ] indirect structure indirectdirect structure side stream component owrate [kmol/h] number of stages number of stages above the feed location column top pressure [kPa] heat exchanger duty [kW] feed quality reux ratio number of stages below the feed location symmetrical structure rectifying section vapour owrate [kmol/h] stripping section vapour owrate [kmol/h] working time [h/yr]

identication column number above the thermal coupling below the thermal coupling generic component condenser feed stage withdrawal of the liquid stream from the main column minimum prefractionator reboiler thermal coupling stage withdrawal of the vapour stream from the main column wall

are separated. The two columns are connected by liquid and vapour countercurrent streams. It has been proved that the Petlyuk conguration requires, compared to all the possible congurations, the lowest total boil-up for a given separation for a three components ideal mixture (Fidkowski and Krolikowski, 1987). Often the Petlyuk conguration is associated to the divided wall column (DWC). In fact the DWC is realized including the prefractionator in the main column. The resulting conguration, reported in Fig. 1b, consists of a single shell column with a partitioning wall that separates the feed location from the side draw of the middle boiling component. The liquid reux from the condenser and the vapour from the reboiler are splitted through on the two sides of the wall. The Petlyuk and the DWC congurations can be considered equivalent from the energetic point of view assuming that no heat transfer across the wall occurs (Lestak et al., 1994). Capital cost savings are expected to be considerable due to the single shell column conguration (Becker et al., 2001). The total vapour reduction of these congurations was quantied in the range of 1050% compared to the classical direct and indirect simple column sequences (Agrawal and Fidkowski, 1998). Notwithstanding the evident benets of this kind of conguration only in the last years it becomes more attractive and its applicability more realistic (Agrawal, 1999). The principal limitation in employing this structure was the lack in the design and the difculty in the controllability of the system; anyway with modern control techniques, more suitable mathematical knowledge, high modelling tools and dynamic simulations, the problem can be easily overcome (Halvorsen and Skogestad, 1997; Parkinson et al., 1999). Recently it was estimated that more that 100 DWCs are installed worldwide with a trend of 10 columns built each year (Parkinson, 2007). The Petlyuk or its equivalent DWC structure, reported in Fig. 1a and b respectively, are considered for a three components separation, while the methodology was recently extended also to a higher number of components in the feed mixture (Rong and Turunen, 2006; Christiansen et al., 1997). However the controllability of the system was proved only for three components separations and up to date no serious attempts have been made to implement more complex systems. For this reason, in this work, only Petlyuk/DWCs for the separation of three component mixtures are considered. In particular, the possibility to use a Petlyuk/DWC together with a simple column for the separation of a four components mixture is evaluated considering different design lay-outs. The results obtained are compared in order to identify the most energy saving solution, moreover the Petlyuk and the DWC structures are independently considered for the capital cost evaluation.

2.

Case study

Greek symbols relative volatility Underwoods active root

in Fig. 1a and consists of two interconnected columns. The rst column, called prefractionator, performs a preliminary non-sharp separation for the middle boiling component, in the second column the mixture of the lightest and the middle components is separated in the upper part of the column, while in the bottom the middle and the highest components

A mixture of 1000 kmol/h of normal parafn, from butane to heptane, and the 5 different composition cases reported in Table 1, was considered. For each composition case, according to Thompson and King (1972), 5 different simple column sequences are possible. All the sequences were simulated using Aspen Plus 13.0 and considering a molar purity of 0.99 for each component. The simplied DSTWU model based on the WinnUnderwood Gilliland method was rst used to initialize the rigorous simulations performed with the RadFrac model. The top column pressure was chosen as the minimum pressure, above or equal to the atmospheric one, to assure a

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Fig. 1 (a) Petlyuk conguration, (b) DWC conguration and (c) three columns model.

Table 1 Composition feed cases. Component Case 1 Case 2 Case 3 Case 4 Case 5

Molar fraction
A: n-C4 H10 B: n-C5 H12 C: n-C6 H14 D: n-C7 H16 0.70 0.10 0.10 0.10 0.10 0.10 0.10 0.70 0.25 0.25 0.25 0.25 0.10 0.40 0.40 0.10 0.40 0.10 0.10 0.40

distillate temperature at least of 50 C. In this way is it possible to use cold water as auxiliary uid in the overhead condensers. A single tray pressure drop of 0.1 psi was considered and the tray efciency was neglected. The feed was assumed as saturated liquid at the pressure of 1 atm. The heat exchanger area was evaluated with the usual design formula by considering an average heat exchange coefcient of 1800 kJ/(m2 h C) and 2100 kJ/(m2 h C) for condensers and reboilers respectively. A minimum temperature approach of 10 C in the heat exchangers, an annual running time of 8000 h/yr and a plant life time of 10 years were also assumed. The Douglas correlations for the capital cost estimation were utilized (Douglas, 1988) considering that are simple to use and the results comparable to more recent data (Taal et al., 2003). The capital costs were updated to year 2008 by the Marshall and Swift index (Chemical Engineering, 2008). The operational costs related to hot and cold utilities are referred to European prices (Errico et

al., 2008). The column diameter calculations were performed assuming vapour velocities with a ooding fraction equal to 0.8. The ooding velocity was estimated using the correlation given by Fair (1961), available in the simulator. The downcomer area was assumed equal to 10% of the total tray area. Carbon steel shells and sieve trays 0.6 m spaced are considered for all the columns. The best simple column conguration was identied by utilizing the total annual cost (TAC) as the economic index and the results are reported in Fig. 2. Details about the conguration parameters, column diameters, heat exchangers area and energy consumption for the selected best SCs are reported in Table 2.

3. Generation of the alternative congurations

Once that the best simple column conguration is identied, it is possible to dene the new structures obtained by substituting 2 simple columns with a Petlyuk/DWC. In the case of 4 component separation, 3 simple columns are necessary and from each best simple column sequence selected by using the TAC index, it is possible to generate two new structures. The former is obtained utilizing the rst simple column of the sequence followed by a Petlyuk/DWC. In the latter case the rst 2 simple columns are substituted by a Petlyuk/DWC followed by the last simple column of the sequence. Fig. 3 shows the structure considered for each composition case obtained

Fig. 2 TAC values for the SC sequences.

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Table 2 Design parameters and energy consumption of the best SC congurations selected. Best SC C1
N Nf R P [kPa] DD [m] Ac [m2 ] Ar [m2 ] Qc [kW] Qr [kW] 40 16 0.83 480 3.10 749 857

Case 1 C2
33 14 2.50 170 1.48 211 76 12339.71 14687.50

Case 2 C3
30 15 2.85 110 1.86 160 108

Case 3 C3
28 14 1.42 480 1.12 141 53

Case 4 C3
30 15 2.05 110 2.73 289 276

Case 5 C3
33 17 1.15 110 2.83 326 320

C1
35 18 0.19 220 3.77 790 355

C2
60 27 1.00 310 1.63 286 183 10820.07 15073.76

C1
40 20 1.33 480 2.76 338 593

C2
40 20 2.41 160 2.43 606 175 15077.12 17412.86

C1
40 18 3.00 480 2.62 233 345

C2
27 14 1.95 160 2.87 812 212 17182.39 18609.00

C1
32 16 0.96 480 2.97 458 365

C2
45 20 3.20 110 2.73 656 259 13037.44 16409.57

C3
42 21 2.00 160 1.54 215 78

from the best simple column sequences already selected in the previous paragraph.

4.

Modelling

Develop a design model to describe the steady state behaviour of a divided wall column is not an easy task. In the most used process simulation packages, like Aspen Plus, Petlyuk/DWC congurations are not available as a standard unit operation already implemented in the simulator libraries. For this reason DWCs must be considered as a combination of simple columns connected by thermal couplings (Becker et al., 2001). Usually the design procedure for a simple distillation column starts with the choice of a short-cut method to initialize more rigorous calculations. It is possible to extend this modus operandi also to DWCs, even if the application of the traditional short-cut methods (Underwood, Fenske, Gilliland, etc.) is actually under discussion (Triantafyllou and Smith, 1992; Muralikrishna et al., 2002; Sotudeh and Shahraki, 2007). The application of the Underwood method for the evaluation of the minimum vapour owrate in the column is the most used methodology and its modication for thermally coupled systems today is a well known procedure (Carlberg

and Westerberg, 1989). Instead different approaches are proposed for the evaluation of the minimum and the theoretical number of stages (Kim, 2001; Sotudeh and Shahraki, 2008). In this work the procedure followed by Muralikrishna et al. (2002), here briey resumed, has been considered. This procedure was chosen because allows to identify the complete space that includes all the possible operational points for the Petlyuk/DWC conguration, then the identied space can be explored to get the best solution by using a specic objective function. The Petlyuk/DWC conguration can be modelled using the three columns model reported in Fig. 1c. In the rst column it is possible to apply the Underwood equations in their original form (Underwood, 1948): i fi = F (1 q) j (1)

i i

i i

i d1i = (d1A + d1B + d1C ) (1 + R1m ) j

(2)

By considering that in the prefractionator there is one distributing component (B), Eq. (1) can be solved with a common regula falsi to obtain the two active roots. For a separation

Fig. 3 Structures derived from the best SC congurations.

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that takes place at innite reux ratio, the Fenske equations (Fenske, 1932) can be utilized to calculate the minimum number of stages for the separation. With some mathematical elaborations (Treybal, 1980) and dening an effective reux ratio above the minimum, it is possible to calculate the theoretical number of stages by the Gilliland correlation (Gilliland, 1940). The design of the prefractionator ends with the application of the Kirkbride equation (Kirkbride, 1944) to identify the feed location. The methodology sequence described can be applied also to the other two columns considering the modied Underwood equations so as proposed by Carlberg and Westerberg (1989). Both the columns downstream to the prefractionator realize a sharp separation between the light and heavy key component. Since no distributing components are present only one Underwoods root is active. Obviously to adapt the three columns model to the Petlyuk/DWC conguration the following two conditions must be satised: 1. Considering that columns 2 and 3 substitute the main column of the Petlyuk conguration, the rectifying vapour owrate for column 3 must be equal to the stripping vapour owrate of the column 2. In this way it is possible to merge the two columns in an only one. This consideration is valid when a liquid withdrawal is considered. V2 = V3 (3)

Table 3 Cost parameters used in Eq. (12). Cost parameters

C [$/m yr] C [$/m2 yr] C [$/kmol] Y [h/yr] E [%] G [kmol/h m2 ] G [kmol/h m2 ]
2

Value
296.01 17.76 20.61 103 8000 90 219.71 0.49

4. the B quantity in the bottom of the prefractionator must be at least equal to the B quantity in the bottom of column 3; b1B = (fB d1B ) b3B d1B fB b3B

(8)

5. the owrate of C from the bottom of the prefractionator should be equal to or higher than the quantity of the same component in the residue of column 3: b1C = (fC d1C ) b3C d1C fC b3C

(9)

6. the feasible design space must include all the cases with a reux ratio of the prefractionator higher than the correspondent minimum value: R1 R1,m (10)

2. The second condition requires that the number of theoretical plates in the prefractionator is equal to the sum of the stages of the stripping section (below the thermal coupling connection) and of the rectifying section (above the thermal coupling connection) of the second and third column respectively. N1 = r2 + n3 (4)

7. the number of stages for the prefractionator must be higher than the sum of the minimum number of stages corresponding to the stripping and rectifying sections of column 2 and 3 respectively obtained from the Fenske and Kirkbride equations: (r2 + n3 )m N1 (11)

This condition is not a real bond, but is derived from the practical observation that if a DWC is considered, it is better to have a close number of plates on both sides of the wall to assure a good column stability. The denition of the design space is related to seven bounds summarized as follows: 1. the prefractionator distillate ow rate of component A is higher than or equal to the same component ow rate in column 2; d1A d2A (5)

Once the design space is dened the simplied function for the TAC reported in Eq. (12) was chosen to select the attractive design options for the subsequent rigorous simulations (Happel and Jordan, 1975): TAC = C C (1 + R) + C (1 + R) N(1 + R) + EYG YG (12)

2. the prefractionator distillate owrate of component B is higher than or equal to the same component owrate in column 2; d1B d2B (6)

It should be noted that this relation was originally developed for simple column congurations but, in the case of Petlyuk/DWCs, no simplied expressions are available and probably for these systems the internal column costs, included in the rst term of Eq. (12), are higher compared to the simple column congurations due to the internal wall. Anyway at this stage of evaluation, and taking into account that the design space was mapped using a short-cut method, this approximation seems reasonable for the rst selection of trial design parameters. Table 3 summarizes the parameters values used in Eq. (12).

5.

Simulation and results

3. the maximum quantity of component A in the prefractionator distillate owrate is limited from the A quantity in the feed; d1A fA (7)

Using the short-cut methodology for the Petlyuk/DWC conguration a Fortran code was compiled to initialize the rigorous simulations performed by means of Aspen Plus 13.0. All the parameters obtained, like the number of trays, the feed locations, the thermal coupling owrates are checked and then

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Table 4 Design parameters and energy consumption of the SC + DWC sequences. SC + DWC SC
N Np Nf NL NV Ns LTC [kmol/h] VTC [kmol/h] R P [kPa] DD [m] Ac [m2 ] Ar [m2 ] Qc [kW] Qr [kW]
a

Case 1 DWC
36 20 13 7 25 20 165.60 133.20 4.75 160 1.37/1.97a 388 201 10838.51 13399.35

Case 2 SC
35 18 0.19 220 3.77 790 355

Case 3 SC
40 20 1.33 480 2.76 338 593

Case 4 SC
40 18 3.00 480 2.62 233 345

Case 5 SC
32 16 0.96 480 2.97 458 365

DWC
32 19 10 6 23 15 86.40 280.80 5.90 480 1.26/1.96a 402 140 10657.22 14989.28

DWC
35 20 13 8 26 21 331.20 406.80 5.05 160 2.18/3.37a 1077 549 13617.24 16297.27

DWC
35 17 6 7 23 13 306.00 540.00 3.75 160 2.40/3.80a 1312 692 15346.34 17138.62

DWC
35 23 16 7 29 23 396.00 306.00 14.5 160 2.01/3.50a 1106 234 14998.78 18464.84

40 16 0.83 480 3.10 749 857

Prefractionator/main column.

optimized by sensitive analysis to reach the minimum energy consumption. The pressure of the Petlyuk/DWC conguration is dened according to the highest pressure value of the substituted SCs. The results of conguration parameters, thermal couplings owrate, diameters, heat exchanger area and energy consumption, are summarized in Tables 4 and 5.

5.1.

Energy comparison

The main advantage expected for these types of congurations is the possibility to achieve an energy load reduction. This aspect is considered rst using the total condenser and reboiler duty to compare, for each composition case, the best SC sequence with those derived substituting 2 simple columns with a Petlyuk/DWC. For composition cases 1, 3 and 4 the direct sequence is the best simple conguration. Thus, by considering rst the combination SC + DWC, so as reported in Fig. 3, the rst SC remains unchanged and performs the separation of the lightest component at the highest pressure, then the Petlyuk/DWC column completes the separation. The saving is quantied in about 12, 10 and 11% for condenser and 9, 6 and 8% for the reboiler duties respectively. For composi-

tion case 2, where the best SC sequence is the indirect one, the substitution of the last two columns with a Petlyuk/DWC forces to perform the separation at the highest pressure to assure the possibility to condensate the lightest component in ordinary water cooled condenser. In this way all the three components (A, B, C) are separated at the same pressure with a penalty for the separation efciency. Comparing, for this composition case, the results for the best SC reported in Table 2 with those obtained for the SC + DWC sequence included in Table 4 it is possible to notice that the energy consumption can be considered similar, or equal to the approximation of the evaluation method. Composition case 5 is the only one where the SC + DWC conguration is more energy demanding compared to the corresponding best SC. The reason can be attributed to the feed component distribution: in cases 1 and 3 the Petlyuk/DWC column is fed by an equimolar stream, instead in case 4 there is an equal excess of component B and C removed from the distillate and the side stream respectively. In composition case 5 the feed contains an equal excess of the lightest and heaviest components and taking into account that the best SC is the direct-indirect, in the SC + DWC conguration the rst simple column removes the excess of the

Table 5 Design parameters and energy consumption of the DWC + SC sequences. DWC + SC Case 1 DWC
N Np Nf NL NV Ns LTC [kmol/h] VTC [kmol/h] R P [kPa] DD [m] Ac [m2 ] Ar [m2 ] Qc [kW] Qr [kW]
a

Case 2 SC
30 15 2.85 110 1.86 159 87

Case 3 SC
28 14 1.42 480 1.12 141 53

Case 4 SC
30 15 2.17 110 2.68 299 231

Case 5 SC
33 20 1.02 110 2.73 335 187

DWC
34 24 12 4 24 14 252.00 936.00 8.98 310 3.01/4.92a 1428 728 14256.28 19015.70

DWC
32 19 9 5 23 13 248.40 975.60 5.55 400 2.69/3.87a 1694 471 15419.53 18114.52

DWC
39 17 10 9 22 13 288.00 864.00 17.40 420 2.57/3.94a 1536 1538 16506.61 18489.55

DWC
33 22 19 5 27 15 756.00 1692.00 5.80 480 3.80/5.17a 1586 1586 16845.23 21780.62

SC
42 21 2.00 160 1.37 206 55

34 24 17 4 28 14 162.00 1144.80 1.91 480 2.67/3.89a 1188 613 14197.68 16735.29

Prefractionator/main column.

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lightest component, so the feed to the Petlyuk/DWC is a stream unbalanced in the heaviest component. The energy performances of the DWC + SC congurations are summarized in Table 5 together with the design parameters. For all the composition cases the DWC + SC conguration appears to be not convenient from the energetic point of view. There is the only exception of the composition case 4 where a saving of 4% in the condenser duty was achieved, while the duty of the reboiler is similar to that of the corresponding best SC sequence. In the other congurations, derived from the direct or from the direct indirect (cases 1, 3 and 5), the Petlyuk/DWC is forced to operate at the highest pressure with a penalization in the separation efciency. For the composition case 2 the highest pressure column is the SC, anyway the DWC is fed with an excess of heaviest component that makes not suitable to employ this conguration. It is possible to conclude that the pressure and the feed component distribution are the main parameters that affect the energy consumption of the Petlyuk/DWC congurations when are used in substitution of two SCs.

Table 6 Normalized capital cost of the selected congurations for the Petlyuk and the DWC design. SC + DWC
Case 1 Case 3 Case 4

Petlyuk
0.89 0.99 1.09

DWC
0.86 0.99 0.98

capital cost, normalized with respect to the capital cost of the corresponding best SC, are reported in Table 6. From these results it is possible to notice that the Petlyuk conguration is particularly convenient in composition case 1 where the main column is fed at the lowest owrate compared to the other cases considered. The main column diameter increases as the feed owrate increases, thus reducing the convenience to employ the Petlyuk conguration as evidenced in cases 3 and 4.

5.2.2.

DWC capital cost evaluation

5.2.

Capital cost comparison

Moreover the possibility of energy saving, the Petlyuk/DWC conguration has the potential of a capital cost reduction. In most of the specialized literature a reduction of about 30% of the capital cost was estimated (Kolbe and Wenzel, 2004; Lestak and Collins, 1997). Anyway it is not clear how this value was obtained. It is known that employing a DWC for the separation of a three components mixture allows saving one condenser and one reboiler, compared to the traditional SC sequence, but no indications were provided about the total exchanger area that is the main parameter related to the cost. Also some savings in the column shell cost are achievable but it was not evidenced how to allocate the prefractionator in the main column and how to evaluate the corresponding diameter. To this regard the rst parameter that we considered for the comparison is the heat exchanger area requested for condensers and reboilers. By comparing the results reported in Table 2 for the best SCs and in Tables 4 and 5 for the SC + DWC and DWC + SC conguration respectively, it is possible to notice that even if the DWC allows to reduce the number of equipments, the total exchanger area, in most of the cases, is higher than of the simple column congurations. The second parameter considered for the capital cost evaluation is the sum of the costs associated to the distillation column internals and shell. Anyway, considering that the main scope of the alternative proposed congurations is to reduce the energy demand of the plant, it was chosen to limit the capital cost analysis only to the sequences where an appreciable energy saving was achieved (i.e. congurations SC + DWC for composition cases 1, 3 and 4). To this regard the column capital cost of the Petlyuk and DWC conguration must be considered separately.

A method for the capital cost evaluation of this column is actually not well dened. First of all in the case of DWC the presence of the internal dividing wall makes unreliable the classical equations used for the plate cost calculations, but on the other hand simplied correlations are not available and the main producers are reluctant to give this type of information. A few researchers made the assumption to use the classical cost evaluation formulas considering in the case of the DWC conguration only the stages of the main column, but no indications are provided about the diameter considered for the zone of the column with the wall (Wolff and Skogestad, 1995; Amminudin et al., 2001). Fig. 4 shows the diameter prole in the main column of the Petlyuk obtained from the simulations for the composition cases selected. It is possible to notice that in the column section included between the thermal couplings there is a reduction of the diameter value. This zone corresponds to the right side of the wall section in the DWC. To allocate the prefractionator in the main column is necessary to add the area of the prefractionator to the corresponding area of the main column; in this way it is possible to dene the diameter required for the DWC. Table 7 reports the results of the diameter calculations considering the three sections of the DWC: the stages above, below the wall and in the divided wall section. From the results it is evident the possibility to take advantage from the construction of a single diameter column. The results obtained for the capital cost evaluation, normalized with respect to the corresponding best SC cases, are reported in Table 6 together with those of the Petlyuk congurations.

5.2.1.

Petlyuk capital cost evaluation

The Petlyuk conguration, so as previously described, is the combination of two columns, the prefractionator and the main column connected by thermal couplings. Both the columns cost can be evaluated using the classical simplied correlations (Douglas, 1988), utilizing the columns diameter and the stages number reported in Table 4 for the prefractionator and the main column respectively. The column height for the prefractionator is calculated without considering vapour and liquid disengagement. The results obtained for the total

Fig. 4 Diameter stage distribution in the Petlyuk main column for the selected cases.

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Table 7 Diameter values in the DWC sections for the selected cases. SC + DWC
Da [m] Dw [m] Db [m]

Case 1
1.97 1.93 1.91

Case 3
3.37 3.27 3.35

Case 4
3.80 3.26 3.75

Thus from the results it is possible to conclude that the DWC layout outperforms or equalizes at least (case 3) the Petlyuk disposition.

6.

Conclusions

The DWC congurations for the separation of a four components mixture with 5 different feed composition cases are studied. The best SC conguration is chosen as the basis for the comparison with the new congurations obtained by introducing a Petlyuk/DWC structure. The most promising structures are rst selected on the basis of the lowest energy consumption. From the calculations it was evidenced that the Petlyuk/DWC is not convenient when this conguration is utilized to replace two SCs with a high pressure difference. For all the simple congurations where there is a decreasing value of the pressure through the columns (i.e. direct, direct-indirect sequences) it is convenient to use rst a SC and then to perform the last separation by using a Petlyuk/DWC arrangement. The most promising cases correspond to Petlyuk/DWC fed with equimolar of equal excess of lightest and middle component mixtures. With regard to the capital costs evaluation, a detailed evaluation was carried out considering separately the Petlyuk and the DWC congurations. The analysis was performed considering the total exchanger area together with the column internals and shell. In particular the DWC diameter was estimated considering the prefractionator and the main column design of the corresponding Petlyuk structure. This aspect is very important because the real application of DWC columns must properly consider such design indications for the DWC structure. From the obtained results it can be concluded that the DWC outperforms both the SC conguration and the Petlyuk structure. It should be noted that the main advantage of Petlyuk/DWC arrangements remains the potential in energy saving while a minor prot can be obtained for the capital costs.

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