Ethyl Tert-Butyl Ether (ETBE) Production by Reactive Distillation Process: Simulation and Genetic Algorithm Optimization

Considering the limitations of energy consumption and the increasing problems of pollution from low-quality fossil fuels and the need to increase the quality of these fuels by using oxygen additives such as Ethyl tert-butyl ether (ETBE) for their combustion, reviewing and optimizing the production processes of oxygen additives is of great importance. The goal of this study is to simulate-optimize the (ETBE) production which is used as an oxygenate gasoline additive in the production of gasoline from crude oil. The feed for the ETBE unit comprised two flows of hydrocarbon and ethanol. The Soave-Redlich-Kwong (SRK) equation of state for the vapor phase and the UNIQUAC activity coefficient model for the liquid phase have been used. In this work, at first, the reactive distillation process was simulated by HYSYS software for producing ETBE. Then, the coding was written using MATLAB software and the Genetic algorithm (GA). Both software has been linked simultaneously and the later optimization data was transferred and compared with HYSYS data. The objective function was reflected as the total annual income of ETBE production. The parameters of the objective function were optimized by GA. Optimization was made on decision variables of the objective function which included the output stream temperature of the heater (T-ho), input stream temperature of reactive distillation tower (T-ti), output stream temperature of cooler (T-co), and input stream feed pressure of distillation tower (P-ti). The results of GA optimization show that reboiler duty decreases by 10% as well as total annual profit increases by 15%. Additionally, the comparison of the present work with the findings of researchers reveals a good agreement.