Simulation of Reactive Distillation Column for Biodiesel Production

In this study, the continuous flow biodiesel production process within a reactive distillation (RD) column filled with a heterogeneous basic CaO catalyst was simulated using Aspen HYSYS software. According to literature, the transesterification reaction involving triglycerides (such as tripalmitin, tristearin, triolein, and trilinolein) follows a first-order forward reaction mechanism. For waste cooking oil (WCO), the activation energy (Ea) and frequency factor (A₀) were identified. Within the Aspen HYSYS simulation software, the General NRTL model was selected as the fluid package to accurately account for the non-ideal phase behavior of the system. The reaction zone, defined between Stages 1 to 10, modeled the base-catalyzed reaction of triglycerides with methanol to produce esters. Following the simulation, optimal process conditions were determined. The simulation aimed to maximize the sum of the conversion rate in the bottom product. As a result, the optimum operating parameters were established as follows: reboiler duty, reflux ratio, total feed rate, and methanol/WCO molar ratio. Overall, the simulation results were found to be highly consistent with existing literature, demonstrating that the model created in Aspen HYSYS effectively represents the biodiesel production process