Certain investigation of model predictive controller design for reactive distillation column in biodiesel production

Abstract

newline Biodiesel is promoted as a green replacement to fossil fuels. In the newlinelast decade, the biofuels have developed as a viable substitute to the crude based newlinefuels. Biofuels are renewable energy resources made up of Fatty Acid Methyl newlineEsters (FAME), attained from combining triacylglycerol present in vegetable newlineoils or fats with methanol and catalysts through trans esterification process. newlineRecent developments in biofuel extraction use a reactive distillation column as newlineit combines the reaction and extraction process into a single unit, thereby newlinesignificantly reducing the capital cost and energy consumption. However, newlineperforming transesterification and extracting excess methanol simultaneously is newlinechallenging due various factors such as instabilities in the column temperature, newlinedeviations in the feed, reflux ratio, reboiler duty etc. Therefore, an advanced newlinecontrol strategy is to ensure desired product quality, minimize energy newlineconsumption and increase product throughput