Modeling the liquid back mixing characteristics for a kinetically controlled reactive distillation process

The state of the art equilibrium model and the rate-based models for reactive distillation (RD) are well known and have been used since a couple of decades. However, these models are not sufficient to represent a slow reaction process that is kinetically controlled. This shortcoming is due to neglecting the effect of liquid back mixing on the whole process. This work starts with reviewing the modeling approach for the RD and then discusses the applicability of various models. The main focus is on the extension of the dynamic rate-based model to take into account the liquid back mixing. We also show how the axial dispersion is introduced into the RD model, without adopting the axial dispersion model. The results of the rate-based model were compared, with and without the axial dispersion. Remarkably, the extended model predicts more accurately the kinetically controlled process, as compared to the conventional rate-based model.