Problem with distilling methanol! ! !
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If I want to use a 3000L enamel reactor to distill anhydrous methanol, with raw material of 99% purity and less than 1% moisture content, is it possible to do so? What kind of distillation tower is needed? Let’s all discuss it! ! !
Based on my experience, it’s very difficult to do this; multiple towers need to be connected in series first for azeotrope formation and then for distillation
It may be difficult to achieve this using a distillation tower, as it forms an azeotrope, and simple distillation or rectification makes purification challenging. Using methods such as molecular distillation or passing through molecular sieves.
Methanol and water are not azeotropic! ! ! ! !
Although water and methanol are not azeotropic, the XY phase diagram shows that when the methanol concentration is very high, the equilibrium line and the diagonal are quite close to each other; in other words, many theoretical plates are required to separate anhydrous methanol. If it is 99% methanol, using distillation for dehydration is very uneconomical; other methods such as adsorption are recommended.
Distillation simply won’t work; fractional distillation is required