ABSTRACT
Recovery of trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) by distillation is difficult due to the existence of a high boiling azeotrope. Esterification of TFA to ethyl trifluoroacetate was performed in this work in order to recover the acid from its dilute aqueous mixture. The reaction was carried out in a batch reactor. Parameter estimation was done to obtain a kinetic model by using the experimental data. Reactive distillation studies were performed to explore its feasibility and process intensification. Methodology to obtain almost pure ethyl trifluoroacetate from dilute aqueous reaction mixture was devised.
Nomenclature
A − 15 | = | Amberlyst − 15 |
BRD | = | Batch reactive distillation |
CRD | = | Continuous reactive distillation |
ER | = | Eley-Rideal |
ETFA | = | Ethyl trifluoroacetate |
EtOH | = | Ethyl alcohol |
GC | = | Gas Chromatography |
IER | = | Ion exchange resin |
IPTFA | = | Isopropyl trifluoroacetate |
LHHW | = | Langmuir-Hinshelwood-Hougen-Watson |
LLE | = | Liquid-Liquid Equilibrium |
MeOH | = | Methyl alcohol |
MTFA | = | Methyl trifluoroacetate |
NaOH | = | Sodium hydroxide |
p – TSA | = | p-toluenesulfonic acid |
PH | = | Pseudohomogeneous |
PI | = | Process Intensification |
RD | = | Reactive distillation |
RS | = | Reactive separation |
SBRD | = | Semi-batch reactive distillation |
SSE | = | Sum of squares of error |
TCD | = | Thermal conductivity detector |
TCS | = | Critical solution temperature |
TFA | = | Trifluoroacetic acid |
VLE | = | Vapor Liquid Equilibrium |
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the help and guidance from Dr. Sunil Bhongale and Dr. Sanjay Kamble of NCL (CSIR) Pune, India.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).