Enhanced reaction extraction distillation via multi-objective optimization and 4E analysis for sustainable recovery of organic compounds from wastewater

Resource utilization and sustainable treatment of wastewater, which can achieve efficient energy utilization and environmental protection, have received hot social attention. Tetrahydrofuran and methanol are the two most common substances in pharmaceutical wastewater. It is very necessary to explore the wastewater treatment process containing these two substances. In this study, extractive distillation and reactive distillation were proposed to effectively separate the tetrahydrofuran-methanol-water component of pharmaceutical wastewater. To further reduce energy consumption, two strengthening processes, double-column reactive-extractive distillation and reactive-extractive dividing wall column distillation were designed. Taking the minimum operating and equipment cost as the objective function, the processes were optimized by using the multi-objective genetic optimization algorithm to obtain the best process parameters. Four processes were evaluated in terms of total annual cost, energy consumption, gas emissions and thermodynamic efficiency. Compared to the traditional three-column extractive distillation process, the above-mentioned four aspects of the reactive-extractive dividing wall column process was reduced by 40.63%, 43.13%, 43.14% and 17.71%, respectively. The reactive-extractive dividing wall column distillation process is of great significance for the efficient purification of valuable organic matter in wastewater and environmental protection.