1.6. In the manufacture of absolute alcohol by fermentation, the product is separated and purified using several stages of distillation. In the first stage, a mixture of 5 mol per cent ethanol in water, with traces of acetaldehyde and fusel oil, is concentrated to 50mol per cent. The concentration of alcohol in the wastewater is reduced to less than 0.1mol per cent. Design a sieve plate column to perform this separation, for a feed rate of 10,000kg/ hour. Treat the feed as a binary mixture of ethanol and water. Take the feed temperature as 20C. The column will operate at 1 atmosphere. Determine: (a) the number of theoretical stages, (b) an estimate of the stage efficiency, (c) the number of actual stages needed. Design a suitable sieve plate for conditions below the feed point. Equilibrium data for the system ethanol-water, at 760mmHg, mol fractions ethanol