Design and intensification of distillation processes for furfural and co-products purification considering economic, environmental, safety and control issues

Furfural is one of those promising chemicals obtained from biomass that is able to compete with petrochemicals. The purification of furfural is one the most critical stages during its production process, due to it requires a great amount of energy. In this sense, liquid-liquid extraction is one of the most promising alternatives. However, the main disadvantage of this alternative is the losses of co-products, which reduces the profitability of the process. This is work is one of the first to show the separation of coproducts of a purification process of furfural-based liquid-liquid extraction. Different intensified alternatives were tested in order to determine the best separation process for purifiying coproducts. The total annual cost, eco-indicator 99, the individual risk and the condition number were used to evaluate economic, environmental, safety and controllability aspects respectively, of the separation alternatives. The results indicate that the intensified alternatives have a reduction on total annual cost and environmental impact of around 25 %, while the improvements on the risk index is around 4 %. To conclude, an indirect intensified alternative was selected as the best option due to an improvement in cost and environmental impact, important risks reduction and similar control properties than those of conventional schemes.

Automated summary

This study tested different intensified alternatives to determine the best purification process for furfural, with results indicating a reduction of around 25% in total annual cost and environmental impact, and an improvement of around 4% in the risk index. An indirect intensified alternative was ultimately chosen as the best option due to improvements in cost, environmental impact, important risks reduction, and similar control properties to conventional schemes.