CHEE 332 Design Project
2013
Bioethanol Distillation Unit Scaleup and Design
December 15, 2010: Canadian Federal Fuel Standard requires
gasoline at fuel pumps contain 5% fuel from “renewable green
sources harvested and produce across Canada”.
- ethanol and biodiesel
- add 2 billion liters of renewable fuels into fuel market
Fuel ethanol and biodiesel plants in Canada
According to Greenfield Ethanol
- 45.6 billion liters of ethanol produced in Canada/USA in 2010
- will grow to 136.8 billion liters by 2020
GreenField Ethanol
- started in 1989
- largest manufacturer of industrial/fuel/beverage grade ethanols in Canada
- 450 mlpy
- Chatham: continuous corn dry milling ethanol distillery
- 103-133 mlpy fuel ethanol (set as basis for our design)
- 75 mlpy industrial alcohol (include in design for primary distillation)
- consume 19 million bushels corn/yr (39.4 bushels/tonne)
- 15,000 tonnes distillers grains sold as feed
- Tiverton: batch process dry milling ethanol distillery
- 3.5 mlph fuel ethanol
- 27 mlph industrial ethanol
- Varennes (Quebec):
- 120 mlpy fuel ethanol
Bioethanol plants - Canada
CNETE, Shawinigan (ethanol from biomass)
Iogen, Ottawa (ethanol from cellulose)
GreenField Ethanol – (Commercial Alcohols)
Chatham (continuous operation)
Tiverton
Varennes
Johnstown
Hensall
Husky Energy, Western Canada (ethanol from wheat)
Lloydminster, SK
NorAmera BioEnergy Corp (ethanol)
Weyburn, SK
Okanagan Biofuels Inc., Kelona, BC
Seaway Grain Processors Inc., Sarnia
Permolex Ltd., (expansion of plant in Red Deer, AL)
Power Stream Energy Services Inc, Collingwood, ON
Minnedos
• Brazil embraced ethanol as fuel (100%) for cars starting in 1970’s
• raw material was sugar cane or molasses
• North America, mainly produced from grain starch (90% from corn)
• derived mainly from whole grain (dry milling) versus wet milling
• Process stages:
• mashing and cooking
• liquefaction (enzymatic)
• highest yields with simultaneous saccharification/fermentation
• mainly continuous operations
• produces fermented beer with 8-12 wt% ethanol
• primary distillation to azeotrope
• dehydration via
• azeotropic ternary distillation, or
• molecular sieves
• processing of animal feed co-products
This week’s homework
Having read paper posted on 332 website, you should be able to answer the following:
- what is difference between wet versus dry milling
- understand saccharification followed by fermentation versus simultaneous s/f
- where does the azeotrope lie for water/ethanol
- wt% basis versus mol% basis for column mass balance
- what causes an azeotrope?
- what is azeotropic distillation
- explain molecular sieves
For next week, do some web based research around GreenField Alcohols Chatham plant
For next week, complete mass balance around primary distillation tower in
molar flows (mol%) and mass flows (wt%).
Design project groups (3/group): design tasks will be assigned to groups
- preliminary experimental design data obtained in pilot plant
- introduction to equipment next week (tutorial)
- preliminary data provided here and obtained experimentally, used to begin
design of distillation tower
- design must include instrumentation and control systems for each unit
- design must include estimate of capital and operating costs of assigned unit
- energy balance around assigned unit and around stages in unit
- health and safety, environmental considerations
Design strategy:
distillation: review thermodynamics of binary ethanol/water system
- which model(s) is appropriate?
- model will be used in design of column using HYSYS process simulator
- experimental data used in design of column using HYSYS and to validate design
instrumentation/control
- specify instrumentation required
- specify measurements to be taken
costing
- identify manufacturers of distillation columns
- who designs distillation columns?
- what is the cost of the designed column
energy balance
- design of condensers, reboilers
Design strategy for primary distillation tower based on
GreenField Ethanol, Chatham ON plant
- 103 – 133 million L/yr fuel ethanol
- say 120 million L/yr basis??? of pure ethanol
- 75 million L/yr industrial ethanol at azeotrope from primary distillation tower
- fermented beer as feed to primary distillation tower, 8-12% (wt%) ethanol
- say 10% basis???