SIMULATION OF ETHANOL

PRODUCTION PROCESS USING ASPEN

PLUS
AND OPTIMIZATION BASED ON RESPONSE SURFACE METHODOLOGY

Moazzam Shahzad Abdulrehman Ishfaq Mirza Aqeel Saifullah

“Polymer and Process “Polymer and Process “Polymer and Process “Polymer and Process
Engineering Department” Engineering Department” Engineering Department” Engineering Department”
moazzams999@gmail.com arehman87@gmail.com maqeel44@gmail.com msaif1998@gmail.com

Supervisor- Nida Abid Supervisor- Nida Abid Supervisor- Nida Abid Supervisor- Nida Abid

Abstract—Glucose production is simulated by Aspen plus for the fermentation process. The
mathematical model for ethanol production is developed by response surface methodology (RSM)
technology. The effecting parameters for the process are feed concentration of the raw material,
temperature and pressure. The statistical tests are used to check these parameters’ performance and
we find out that non-linear quadratic polynomial equation is best for this process behavior. Process
optimization is done to get the maximum concentration of ethanol. This approach performed in such
a way that it can be adopted in industrial applications for the chemical process design. The
optimization will also include the overall cost optimization as the objective is to enhance the yield
and to decrease the conversion of the process which leads to more effective process.
Keywords—Simulation, Aspen plus, Ethanol, Response surface methodology (RSM), Process
optimization.

I. INTRODUCTION
Fermentation process of glucose for ethanol production will be simulated in Aspen plus. Further, we
will employ response surface methodology (RSM) to develop a mathematical model for ethanol
production. The key operating parameters influencing the process performance are identified to be
feed concentration of raw material, temperature and pressure of flash vaporizer. The statistical tests
are used to examine the effect of these parameters on ethanol production. Ethanol is emerging as a
potentially sustainable and renewable energy resource in the world. The application of ethanol and
ethanol-based fuels has attracted much attention worldwide owing to their environmental and
economic advantages [1]. Ethanol is obtained as a result of fermentation of various
renewableresources available in nature. The ease of availability of raw materials for production of
ethanol and wide range of its potential uses, especially energy related, have made ethansol a common
subject of interest to many of the researchers in recent times. Ethanol offers unique characteristics
including high octane number and low carbon content that results in relatively fewer emission of
harmful flue gases, thereby making it a viable green fuel alternative.
Number of commercial process flow sheet simulator software applications are available for industrial
as well as research and development purposes. The common ones include Aspen plus, Hyprotech,
Chemcad and PRO/II.14 In this work, we make use of Aspen plus for process simulation of ethanol
production. We specifically focus on studying fermentation of glucose for producing ethanol.
Fermentation of glucose (C6H12O6) is carried out under the action of yeast as follows:
C6H12O6 (aq) → 2C2H5OH (l) + 2CO2 (g)
Furthermore, in any industrial scale chemical production process, there are several independent
operating variables that affect the performance of the unit operations and processes. Mathematical
tools aid in designing experiments to identify the important parameters impacting the process output
with minimum number of test runs. Response surface methodology (RSM) is one such statistical tool
that gives us the relationship between various independent operating variables to that of the required
responses of the process [1,2]. RSM allows direct observations from experimental data about the
output of a method in a given region. In fact, this knowledge may be fed to commercial software for
further process review. Aspen Plus is a commonly used device for the simulation of steam reforming
H2 development.
 II.Literature Review
Fermentation process of glucose for ethanol production is simulated in Aspen plus. Further, we
employ response surface methodology (RSM) to develop a mathematical model for ethanol
production
[2]. The key operating parameters influencing the process performance are identified to be feed
concentration of raw material, temperature and pressure of flash vaporizer. The statistical tests
are used to examine the effect of these parameters on ethanol production [3]. The results show
that non-linear quadratic polynomial equation is best suited for representing the process behavior.
Moreover, process optimization is performed using the model to maximize the concentration of
ethanol, subject to process constraints. The optimum values of feed concentration of glucose,
temperature and pressure of flash vaporizer are found to be 0.5 (w/w), 55°C and 5.5 atm
respectively. The approach demonstrated here serves as an efficacious method to determine
feasible design space for chemical processes and can be adopted in industrial applications [5].

Figure 1: alcoholic fermentation year wise of Punjab purple for wine production
(Effect of fermentation time (h) on Brix(°B) and ethanol production(%v/v))
III.Flow Sheet

Figure 2: Flow sheet of overall process

 IV.Cost Analysis
Ethanol is volatile, flammable, clear and colorless liquid having antifreeze fuel nature with
largest production among the chemicals in the world. Molecular weight of ethanol is 46.07 with
the density 0.791 at 20C and boiling point 78.3C. The cost analysis can be determined by the
process we choose to produce ethanol. There are two possible methods to produce ethanol that is
anaerobic fermentation of alcohol and aerobic fermentation of alcohol. the main way that the
industry makes ethanol itself from sugarcane so actually the dot point sugarcane. so a couple
different words. we need to know and the industrial production refers to how the industry is so
how the industry makes ethanol and how the industry makes ethanol from sugarcane and sugar
cane was a crop so that's something [6].
The sugarcane which is a plant then we crush it into smaller pieces and we get two different
products we get sucrose juice this is a liquid and forget this bog gaze which is a waste product
this is a waste we don't really need it but we get it from the production of sugarcane and this we
can use to make heat you can burn it and that can be used in other things but this generally is a
waste plucked the main reason why we crush sugar cane is to make this here sucrose choose a
next step is the extraction of sucrose and might have this being 23 percent sucrose but if we
extracted that means we're getting all the sucrose from it and having mostly sucrose so mostly
sucrose not much water itself so here we have juice refers to usually like a mixture between
water and sucrose but now we have sucrose mol A's and that's something syrupy so you can
imagine that to be a syrupy and it's quite thick so this is mostly sucrose now so after extracting
only sucrose from our juice we have only sucrose left and it's called sucrose Malays [7].
We do next is we add some acid and what this acid does is acid kills bacteria and the bacteria
itself might ruin the ethanol because it might turn it in ceased so we're going to make sure we kill
it and we do that by adding acid and then if we deliver it from there to the fermentation drainage
chamber that's basically just a place where we can make a lock place it is supposed to be like a
shameful thing and we have all of our sucrose inside this purple thing is meant to be a sucrose
and here we can ferment it. so fermenting means put a yeast into it right this is locked so nothing
leaves except for maybe carbon dioxide then we add a yeast so here we have an a we add a yeast
and remember [8].
The yeast helps to break down sugar helps break down sugar and it does so by producing enzyme
which can break that sugar into ethanol a specific name for this yeast in this sugar cane
production is used this is a certain type of yeast and it's used to ferment sucrose into ethanol after
we've left you should take some time. This mate might take two days so might be in that chamber
for two days and by the end we have ethanol but it's 10 to 14 percent ethanol so the rest of the so
it's 10 to 14 percent ethanol and the rest would be water so now we have about 86 to 90 percent
water the majority of the water and the rest is ethanol. now what happens next is we go through
distillation helps us to purify so the distillation is to purify and by that is it helps us to remove
that water now after distillation we are from 10 to 40 percent ethanol to 97 percent ethanol.
which means we only have about 3 percent water left so we've removed most of the water but to
go from 97 207 all we still have to do some more water removal to get that really a last 3% [9].
we do that through dehydration makes that hundreds methanol so I'll quickly summarize the main
part seen is know when it comes to this kind of diagram you should know that we have to harvest
and crush sugar cane we also need to be able to ferment this sucrose that we get from magnetic
cane that was also important then we usually do some distillation the third step was distillation
and the reason why we do distillation is to remove that extra water we go through 10242 the
ethanol to 97 percent ethanol and then sometimes if
when I get 100% we also dehydrate to get rid of that extra percent of water to make it hundreds
in ethanol so these four is main steps is the summarized version of the production of sugarcane
but if bigger if you kind of have an idea of what this kind of diagram means and the individual
steps required hope that was useful.
1. Approximate needed land =1.5 hectare location decides the amount of cost and it would be
around 60to 65 lac's
2. Construction material like bricks, sands and rods with delivery cost around about 20,00,0000
3. Construction of office, roads, canteen and location for boiler, distillation column, mini plants,
piping place and safety office 1,50,00,000
4. Cost of key equipment like Dryer machines, milling machines, storage tower and evaporation
tower is around about 8,00,00,000
5. Boiler with the turbine having capacity of 10 ton is around 3, 00,00,000
6. Electrical appliances with maintenance equipment, electricity generator cost with fuel is
estimated around about 2, 00,00,000
7. capital cost including daily wagers pay is around 2,00,00,000
So, the complete project cost up to the production point for 30KLPD ETHANOL plant is around
171500,000 rupees.
But you tSake 60 KLPD plant instead of 30KLPD you have to invest only 2.5 times of above
amount for double production.

V.HAZOP STUDY
Hazop shall divide the system in the series of nodes or sections , and a number of risk analysis
shall then be used for every node to reflect differences in the anticipated process leading to a
danger or operational problem. What is the node 's intention ? A typical chemical process plant is
normally associated with three major hazards types namely, toxic, fire, and explosive hazard. The
hazard question is very complex as it involves the degree of hazard [10].
 Study Process Expected Needs to be
Item Alteration problems Expected outcomes done
Node Parameter

Hig The level of

1. h 1. liquid 1. Need a
peressure in is high. temperature
feed An
drum d pressure
Controll fo
er r
drum
FLASH .
Temperature High
DRUM

Lower CO2
2. Overflow in 2. vapor 2. Pressure
flash recovered at the Indentifi
drum top er is
of flash required
drum. .

Fee Level liquid Insta

1. d 1. of is 1. ll
an
temperature low. pressure d
will be very temperature
hig Controll fo
h er r
the
FLASH drum.
Pressure High
DRUM

Stoppage Blowing up risk

2. and 2. of 2. Pressure
obstructi drum will ver Sens
on be y or is
required
in vapor high. .
stream.

Study Expected Expected

Item Node Process Alteration problems outcomes Needs to be done
Parameter

1. Stoppage and 1. There will be 1. Senso sould

 no r
obstructi dissociatio
on in n. Be of low
inle
the t level.
stream.
FLASH
Level Low
DRUM

inle As there
2. The t 2. is no 2. Required a
stream will dissociatio Temperastu
be n re
ver explosiv chanc
y e es are sensor at the
and hot. pump will be feed stream.
damaged.
Inle No
1. t stream 1. dissociation 1. Required
ver
will be y happens. temperature
chilly and
cold. sensor at the
feed stream.
FLASH
Level High
DRUM
Blowing up
3. Stoppage and 2. risk 3. Pressure
obstructi of drum will
on in be sensor is
the vapour very high. required.
stream.
 Expect
Study Process ed Needs to be
Item Alteration Expected problems outcom done
Node Parameter es

There
is no full
dissociation of Always check the
FLASH Valve complete components
Flow Low . condition of the valve
DRUM open

Valv
e opening too flo
FLASH small Product w is Pump is
Flow High required.
DRUM very slow.
 VI.Aspen simulation
Figure 4: Algorithm for Aspen plus process simulation

Figure 3: Process flow sheet for ethanol production from glucose in Aspen plus
Figure 4: Process flow sheet for ethanol production property data from glucose in Aspen
plus

VII. Experimental design and optimization using response surface methodology

Design Expert software is used to develop a response surface methodology scheme as reported in the
literature. The use of process simulator software is propounded by the aforementioned researchers as
an alternative to the real process experiments [12]. The strategy helps in screening of the
independent operating parameters and the simulation result data obtained can be used for generating
empirical models. For ethanol production process, the independent variables are glucose
concentration in feed, temperature and pressure of flash vaporizer and the dependent variable is mole
fraction of ethanol in the product stream. The lower and higher limits of each independent variable
are selected based on practical considerations as shown in Table 1.
The central composite design (CCD) is applied to design simulation experiments. Design of
experiments approach predicts 20 runs for the process as a combination of various values of
independent variables (table 2). It should be noted that the value of alpha =1.68179 used in CCD
generates two test conditions with infeasible mole fraction (less than 0 and more than 1) [13]. Both
conditions are not used for simulation runs. Each of the feasible test condition is run in Aspen plus
and responses are recorded. The values of ethanol composition are inserted as responses in Design
Expert software as indicated in the last column of The results are analyzed to generate mathematical
model and perform optimization for maximum ethanol output.
VIII. Results and Discussion
Response surface model equation: Design Expert software fits the response data in various
mathematical models and evaluates them forconfidence interval). The cubic and higher order models
are aliased, hence not selected. The overall model equation for mole fraction of ethanol in terms of
independent operating parameters is expressed below goodness of fit. The analysis suggests that the
quadratic model equation fits the data in the best suited manner presents the summary of results
[1,3,15]. The best fit model for the process is the one where the F-value is high and p-value < 0.05
(95%
 Table 1
Lower limit and upper limit for independent variables

Variable description Lower limit Upper limit

Temperature (°C) 10 100

Pressure (atm) 1 10

Mass fraction (glucose) 0.1 0.9

Table 2
Design of test runs and response
Mass fraction Mole fraction
Run (glucose) Temperature (°C) Pressure (atm) (ethanol)

1 -0.17 55 5.5 0

2 0.9 100 10 0.559608

3 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

4 0.1 100 10 0.0460287

5 1.17 55 5.5 0

6 0.9 10 1 0.0214207

7 0.5 55 13.07 0.230144

8 0.1 100 1 0.0041657

9 0.5 130.68 5.5 0.129096

10 0.1 10 1 0.0470789

11 0.9 10 10 0.425023

12 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

13 0.1 10 10 0.0460287

14 0.5 55 -2.07 0.259406

15 0.5 -20.68 5.5 0.230144

16 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

17 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

18 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

19 0.9 100 1 0.0631356

20 0.5 55 5.5 0.261481

 Table 3
Selection of mathematical model

ss Addition Average F p-value

of
Source Squares Df Square Value Prob > F
simple vs Average 0.13 3 0.043 2.17 0.1315
2FI vs simple 0.10 3 0.034 2.04 0.1583
Second order vs 0.11 3 0.038 3.83 0.0460
2FI
3rd order vs second 0.098 4 0.025 112.13 < 0.0001
order
Rmainder 1.31E-003 6 2.188E-004
Total 1.10 20 0.055

Table
4
ANOVA for response surface quadratic
model

Addition of Average F p-value

Source Squares df square Value Prob > F
Model 0.34 9 0.038 3.83 0.0239
A-Temperature 1.480E-004 1 1.480E-004 0.015 0.9053
B-Pressure 0.063 1 0.063 6.30 0.0309
C-Mass fraction
(Glucose) 0.065 1 0.065 6.54 0.0285
AB 2.305E-003 1 2.305E-003 0.23 0.6406
AC 6.007E-003 1 6.007E-003 0.60 0.4551
BC 0.092 1 0.092 9.28 0.0123
A2 0.010 1 0.010 1.01 0.3395
B2 5.135E-004 1 5.135E-004 0.052 0.8248
C2 0.11 1 0.11 11.02 0.0078
Residual 0.099 10 9.947E-003

Table 5
Comparison of results for mole fraction of ethanol at optimized conditions

Process variable Aspen plus Contour plot RSM plot Point prediction

Temperature (°C) 55 55 55 55
 Pressure (atm) 5.5 5.5 5.5 0.5

Mass fraction (glucose) 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5

Mole fraction (ethanol) 0.26148 0.26148 0.26148 0.26304

Figure 5: Contour plots for mole fraction of ethanol as a function of
operating conditions
Figure 6: Response surface graphs for mole fraction of ethanol as a function of
operating conditions
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