Hello everyone,
I need to design a heterogeneous azeotropic distillation system to separate Ethyl Acrylate from a mixture with ethanol and water. The system consists in 2 columns with a decanter in the middle, the aqueous phase have a high water purity and goes to wwt, and the organic phase is split in 2 fractions, one goes back to the first column as a reflux and the other goes to the second column. With this system I can obtain a bottom stream from the second column with at least 95% of Ethyl Acrylate.
As a I don't have much experiece with those systems I'm using data from articles with the same system, but I don't know how to determine that the reflux ratio I'm using is above the minimum reflux. How can I calculate the minimum reflux or at least if the ratio I'm using it's possible? I really don't have much knowledge with this equipments, so a simple method or shortcut even with some associated error would be great.
Thank you