ChE 101 Fundamentals of Chemical Engineering

Principles of Material Balances

Outline
Process Diagrams
Unit Operations
General Material Balance Equation
Mixing, ILAR
Tie Components
Single-Unit Balances
Multiple-Unit Balances
Recycle and Bypass
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Methods of Solving Material Balances

Arithmetic (ratio method)
Algebraic
Combination of arithmetic and algebraic
Graphical

Computer (uses programs or packaged software)

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General Steps in Solving Material Balances

Read

Draw

DFA

Basis

MB

Check

Identify the streams and equipment involved

Sketch a BFD or PFD with all streams

Identify known and unknown parameters

Choose and clearly state a convenient basis

Write overall and component balances, and other relating equations

Consider the given conditions and common sense

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Tie Component
Enters in one input stream only
Exits in one output stream only
Is easily traced, and can be used in relating other components
Ex. Find the mass M4

Tie Component
Ex. You buy 100 kg of cucumbers that contain 99% water. A few
days later they are found to be 98% water. What is the remaining
weight of the cucumbers?
Ex. Drying: A batch dryer can handle 5000 kg feed per hour. 5000
kg of a material containing 30% moisture is to be dried. How much
moisture evaporates per hour if the dried material contains 5%
moisture?
Ex. Evaporation: An evaporator has a capacity to evaporate 30,000
kg of water per hour. We want to concentrate a NaCl-water
solution from 10% to 40%. If the evaporator is to operate at its
rated capacity, what must the feed rate be? How much product is
obtained per hour?
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Tie Component
Ex. Extraction: A copra batch contains 44% oil and is to be extracted
with n-hexane. The extracted meal contains 0.07 kg oil/kg oil-free
matter, and the mass fraction of n-hexane is 0.05. The extract
contains 49% n-hexane. If 10,000 kg of copra are to be processed,
how many kilograms of n-hexane is required?
Ex. Gas Absorption: A gas mixture contains 6.0 mole % acetone, 1.7
mole % water, and the rest, air. The acetone is to be recovered
using an absorption tower that operates at 30C and 101.325 kPa.
10,000 kg water per hour will be used to scrub 180 kmol per h of
entering gas. If the recovery is 96%, calculate the mole fraction of
acetone in the outlet gas and in the outlet water. The outgoing gas
has a partial pressure of water equal to 4.241 kPa. The water is fed
at the top of the tower while the gas, at the bottom.
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Single-Unit Balance
Ex. Distillation: We desire to produce two ethyl alcohol-water
mixtures each containing 90% and 50% alcohol by mole from a
dilute mixture containing 20% mole alcohol by distillation. 98%
of the ethyl alcohol in the feed is to be recovered in these two
products, that is, only 2% of the ethyl alcohol in the feed may
go into the bottoms. If the bottoms contains 0.6% alcohol,
calculate the amount of the different streams per 1000 kmol of
feed stream.

Single-Unit Balance
Ex. Crystallization: One thousand kilograms of a 64% NaNO3
solution in water is at a temperature of 100C. This is sent to a
crystallizer where it is cooled to 30C. At this temperature, the
solubility of NaNO3 is 96 parts per 100 parts of water (the
solubility of NaNO3 is maximum amount of NaNO3 that can
stay in solution; the rests crystallizes out). Calculate the
amount of crystals that precipitates out if
a. No water evaporates during cooling
b. 5% of the original water evaporates during cooling

Single-Unit Balance
Ex. Membrane Separations: The figure below illustrates a
nanoporous membrane used for separating nitrogen from
oxygen in air. What is the composition of the waste stream if
the waste stream amounts to 80% of the input stream?

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