Chemical Engineering Science 59 (2004) 5839 – 5845 www.elsevier.com/locate/ces Analysis of the environmental impact of butylacetate process through the WAR algorithm C.A. Cardona a , ∗ , V.F. Marulanda a , D. Young b a National University of Colombia at Manizales. Cra. 27 No. 64-60 Of. F-505, Caldas, Columbia b National Risk Management Research Laboratory, EPA. Cincinnati, OH 45268, USA Received 5 July 2003; received in revised form 17 May 2004; accepted 30 June 2004 Available online 2 September 2004 Abstract The WAR algorithm, a methodology for determining the potential environmental impact (PEI) of a chemical process, is applied to the case study of n-butyl acetate production. Two different schemes are considered: the conventional process, in which the reaction and separation are carried out in separated devices, and the reactive distillation process in which the reaction and separation are carried out in a packed column simultaneously. TheWAR algorithm allows determining which process is better from the point of view of generation of PEI into the process, based on the output wastes and energetic consumption.  2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Reaction engineering; Environment; Product design; Pollution control; WAR 1. Introduction Reactive distillation has been used as a “clean technology” for chemical synthesis in the industry because of advan- tages like saving of energy cost and reduced capital invest- ment. Comparison of the reactive distillation process with conventional process are poorly mentioned in the literature (Solokhin et al., 1997; Paiva and Malcata, 2000; Cardona and Cubides, 2003). All these comparisons are based on energy consumption. We focus our work to an integral comparison from the point of view of outlet and generation of poten- tial environmental impact (PEI) from the process based on output wastes and energy consumption. The combination of shortcut methods, rigorous calculations and the subsequent modeling and simulation of generated PEI make it possible to assess the real impact of reactive distillation on butyl ac- etate production. ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +57-68-866-766; fax: +57-68-863-220. E-mail address: ccardona@nevado.manizales.unal.edu.co (C.A. Cardona). 0009-2509/$ - see front matter  2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ces.2004.06.043 2. Esterification of acetic acid with n-butanol We study the esterification of acetic acid with n-butanol to produce n-butylacetate. HAc + BuOH H+ ⇔ BuAc + H 2 O. This reversible reaction needs to be catalyzed by strong acids. Sulfuric acid, p-toluenesulfonic acid or solid acidic catalysts are usually used for this purpose (Zhicai et al., 1998). The influence of temperature of the equilibrium constant for the production of butylacetate is shown in Fig. 1. Experimental values of the equilibrium constant are re- ported by Loning et al. (2000). Fig. 1 confirms a good agree- ment between the theoretical and experimental results. Because of the stringent purity requirements on n-butyl acetate (less than 50 ppm acetic acid) the reaction mixture should be fed with a little excess of n-butanol, so that the acetic acid becomes limit reactive ( Venimadhavan et al., 1999). The equilibrium conversion can be found by means of the thermodynamic relation between the equilibrium