The following bubble-point, organic-liquid mixture at 1.4 atm is distilled by extractive distillation with the following phenol-rich solvent at 1.4 atm and at the same temperature as the main feed:The column has 30 sieve trays, with a total condenser and a partial reboiler. The solvent enters the 5th tray and the feed enters tray 15, from the top. The pressure in the condenser is 1.1 atm; the pressure at the top tray is 1.2 atm, and the pressure at the bottom is 1.4 atm. The reflux ratio is 5 and the bottoms rate is 960 kmol/h. Thermodynamic properties can be estimated with the UNIFAC method for the liquid phase and the SRK equation for the vapor phase. The Antoine equation is suitable for vapor pressure. Use the non-equilibrium model of the ChemSep program to estimate the separation. Assume that the vapor and liquid are both well mixed and that the trays operate at 75% of flooding. Specify the Chan-Fair correlation for calculating mass-transfer coefficients. In addition, determine from the tray-by-tray results the average Murphree vapor-tray efficiency for each component (after discarding values that appear to be much different than the majority of values). Try to improve the sharpness of the split by changing the feed and solvent entry tray locations. How can you increase the sharpness of the separation? List as many ideas as you have.

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Component Methanol п-Нехane Feed, kmol/h Solvent, kmol/h 50 50 20 п-Неptane Toluene Phenol 180 150 10 800