Sustainable integrated process design and control for a continuous-stirred tank reactor system

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to highlight the use of a two-dimensional (2D) sustainability index in performing a sustainable integrated process design and control (Sustain-IPDC) for a continuous-stirred tank reactor (CSTR) system. Sustain-IPDC for a CSTR system is formulated as a mathematical programming problem and solved by decomposing it into six sequential hierarchical sub-problems: (i) pre-analysis, (ii) design analysis, (iii) controller design analysis, (iv) sustainability analysis, (v) detailed economic analysis, and (vi) final selection and verification. The proposed methodology is applied to the production of cyclohexanone using a CSTR. The results show that the proposed methodology is capable in finding an optimal solution for a CSTR design problem that satisfy design, control, sustainability and economic criteria in an easy and systematic manner.