Control of steam flow rate in the tower top reboiler
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The flow rate of the heating steam in the reboiler at the bottom of the distillation tower is not adjusted based on the temperature of the material exiting the reboiler; rather, it is controlled by the amount of material leaving the bottom of the distillation tower. Why is that? I had no experience with this kind of control before.
Because the temperature response of the material leaving the bottom of the distillation column is the average bottom temperature of the column.
I really have never seen such a control scheme. From the poster’s description, if it is a control loop formed by the bottom discharge flow rate of the distillation tower and the steam valve, then it is an open-loop control loop. If it’s the outlet temperature, then it is a closed loop after all, but the design seems strange.