In the present study, heat integrated distillation column is modelled and simulated for the production of Methyl tert-Butyl Ether (MTBE) from methanol and isobutylene using ASPEN Plus®. Also, the objective of this study is to have comparative analysis between the reactive distillation process and an alternative intensified process (r-HIDiC) to produce MTBE.
  Rigorous simulation study has been conducted to compare the optimal flow sheet of the above two designs. Temperature and composition profiles are studied and compared for both the models and found that the temperature at the last stage of the stripping section in r-HIDiC is 406 K while that of the stripping section in RDC is 427.24 K. This reduced temperature decreases the composition of methanol in bottom product in stripping column in case of r-HIDiC as methanol forms a homogenous azeotrope with MTBE at 408.53 K. Also, it is found that, although with nominal increase in TAC i.e. 16.56%, in r-HIDiC design as compared to the reactive distillation column design which is caused due to the high cost of the additional compressor needed in the vapour compression, however, the r-HIDiC design can save reboiler and condenser heat duties to a considerable amount i.e. by 35.06% and 36.65% respectively.

中文翻译：

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热集成反应蒸馏塔（r-HIDiC）的建模：MTBE合成的模拟研究

在本研究中，对热集成蒸馏塔进行了建模和模拟，以使用ASPENPlus®从甲醇和异丁烯生产甲基叔丁基醚（MTBE）。另外，本研究的目的是对反应蒸馏过程与生产MTBE的替代强化过程（r-HIDiC）之间进行比较分析。
  进行了严格的仿真研究，以比较上述两种设计的最佳流程。研究并比较了两个模型的温度和成分分布，发现r-HIDiC中汽提段的最后阶段温度为406 K，而RDC中汽提段的最后阶段温度为427.24K。降低的温度降低了成分r-HIDiC情况下汽提塔底部产物中甲醇的含量，因为甲醇与MTBE在408.53 K时形成均相共沸物。此外，发现尽管rACiC设计比TAC标称增加（即16.56％），反应蒸馏塔的设计，这是由于蒸气压缩所需的额外压缩机的高昂成本所致，