Organic compounds -- part of the class 532-570 series – Organic compounds – Oxygen containing
Patent
1990-02-20
1991-10-01
Evans, J. E.
Organic compounds -- part of the class 532-570 series
Organic compounds
Oxygen containing
422256, 568918, C07C 2986, C07C 3108
Patent
active
050535633
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus to concentrate and purify alcohol, and more particularly to the method and apparatus suitable for the concentration and purification of high-purity alcohol from the synthesized alcohol, the used alcohol aqueous solution in food industry and the fermented alcohol in the energy-saving manner.
TECHNICAL BACKGROUND
The fermented alcohol produced from carbohydrates such as sweet potato, potato, corn, etc. is an important material for making various drinks and for industrial applications. Because alcohol concentration produced by fermentation is as low as 10.about.20 wt %, it is necessary to condense it to about 95.about.100 wt %.
Conventionally, the distillation method has been used for this concentration. However, this method is economically disadvantageous because much energy is consumed in heating the water--main component of this material--to 80.about.100.degree. C., and there is a strong demand on the development of an energy-saving method of concentration to replace the conventional means.
On the other hand, it has been proposed to use the energy-saving method to extract, separate and concentrate alcohol from water, using carbon dioxide in supercritical or pseudocritical condition. (Japanese provisional patent publications No. 56-56201 and 59-141528).
However, there is some restrictions to the selective extraction of alcohol when carbon dioxide is used as solvent. Maximum concentration is limited to about 91 wt %, and it is impossible according to the recent report to condense beyond this limit. Also, a large quantity of carbon dioxide (more than 15 weight parts of CO.sub.2 to 1 weight part of 10% aqueous solution of alcohol) is needed because the solubility of alcohol in carbon dioxide is not high enough, and it is earnestly wanted to solve this problem.
As the result, there is a strong demand on the development of a new method and an apparatus to increase alcohol concentration and to raise alcohol solubility.
The purpose of the present invention is to provide the economical method and apparatus to concentrate and purify alcohol, by which it is possible to increase alcohol concentration to more than 91 wt% and to concentrate and recover alcohol by the use of small quantity of solvent.
DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION
The first object of this invention is to provide the method to concentrate and purify alcohol, wherein aqueous solution of alcohol is supplied from the raw material inlet in the middle of countercurrent flow extractor, the propane solvent is supplied from lower portion of said countercurrent flow extractor, said propane solvent is maintained in supercritical or pseudocritical conditions at the portion lower than said raw material inlet, while the propane solvent is maintained in liquid state at the portion higher than said raw material inlet, and the concentrated alcohol, virtually separated from water, is recovered from the upper portion of said countercurrent flow extractor.
The second object of the invention is to offer a method to concentrate and purify alcohol, wherein aqueous solution of alcohol is supplied from the raw material inlet in the middle of countercurrent flow extractor, the propane solvent is supplied form the lower portion of said countercurrent flow extractor, said propane solvent is maintained in supercritical or pseudocritical conditions at the portion lower than said raw material inlet, the propane solvent is maintained in liquid state at the portion higher than said raw material inlet, the propane solvent phase containing the concentrated alcohol, virtually separated from water, is withdrawn from the upper portion of said countercurrent flow extractor, the propane solvent is sent into propane solvent distillation tower, the propane liquid containing alcohol but no water is recovered from the bottom of said distillation tower, the propane gas containing water but no alcohol is recovered from the top of said distillation tower, the compression heat produced by the pressurizatio
REFERENCES:
patent: 4492808 (1985-01-01), Hagen et al.
patent: 4508928 (1985-04-01), Victor
patent: 4956052 (1990-09-01), Hirata et al.
Industrial and Engineering Chemistry Research, vol. 26, No. 2, pp. 254-261, Feb. 1987, Brignole et al.
Horizoe Hirotoshi
Maki Masura
Tanimoto Tetsuya
Yanagi Masaaki
Evans J. E.
Minister of International Trade & Industry
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