No.

Title

Pages

Abstract

Introduction

Objectives

Theory

Procedures

Results

Calculations

Discussions

10

Conclusion

10

11

Recommendation

11

12

References

11

13

Appendices

12

TABLE OF CONTENT

ABSTRACT

This experiment is about the production ethyl chloride by the gas-phase reaction of
HCl with ethylene over a copper chloride catalyst on silica. The main objectives of this
experiment are to install and converge a conversion reactor, to simulate a process involving
reaction and separation and to use Recycle operation in HYSYS. In this process, 50 mol% of
HCl, 48 mol% of C2H4 and 2 mol% of N2 were fed at 100 kmol/hr and 1 atm. Peng-Robinson
equation of state was chosen as the fluid package and no pressure drop was assumed in all
equipment. In order to obtain 100% pure ethyl chloride, a distillation column was added to
separate unreacted reagents. The distillate stream from the distillation column is splitted into
two streams by using TEE model which are recycle stream and purge stream. Purge is to
prevent the accumulation of inerts in the system, so 10 kmol/hr is withdrawn in a purge
stream.
As for the second part of the experiment, it is about maximizing the venture profit in
the production of ethyl chloride. Spreadsheet mainly is used to calculate the maximum
venture profit that can be obtained by adjusting the purge flow rate. By inserting the
appropriate values in the spreadsheet, the maximum venture profit is calculated and a graph
of Venture Profit (lb/hr) versus Purge Flow Rate (lbmole/hr) is plotted. Based on the graph, it
the lowest venture profit is estimated at 9100 lb/hr which is at purge flow rate of 10 kmole/hr.
As for the maximum venture profit that can be obtained is at the flow rate of 7.5 kmole/hr
with the venture profit value of 1.04 x 104 lb/hr.

INTRODUCTION

Ethyl chloride is a chemical compound with chemical formula C2H5Cl, once widely used in
producing tetra-ethyl lead, a gasoline additive. It is a colourless, flammable gas or
refrigerated liquid with a faintly sweet odour. Ethyl chloride is produced by the reaction of
ethylene and hydrogen chloride over an aluminium chloride catalyst at temperatures ranging
from 130-250C. Under these conditions, ethyl chloride is produced according to the
chemical equation:
C2H4 + HCl C2H5Cl
At various times in the past, ethyl chloride has also been produced from ethanol and
hydrochloric acid, or from ethane and chlorine, but these routes are no longer economical.
Some ethyl chloride is generated as a by-product of polyvinyl chloride production.
Industrial use of this chlorinated hydrocarbon has declined sharply due to environmental
concerns. In fact, the only consistent use of this chemical in manufacturing today is in the
production of cosmetics and paints, where it is used to enhance the binding and thickening
properties of cellulose. Ethyl chloride has retained value as a skin coolant and anaesthetics,
however, and has emerged as a treatment for pain relief from muscle soreness.
Ethane may be chlorinated thermally, catalytically, photochemically or electrolytically.
Monochlorination is favoured because ethyl chloride chlorinates at about one-fourth of the
rate of which it is itself produced from ethane. Thermal chlorination of ethane is generally
carried out at 250-500 C. The chlorine and ethane are brought together in a fluid bed of
finely, inert, solid heat-transfer medium at 380-440 C the linear velocity of the gas is
sufficient to maintain the finely divided solid in suspension within the reactor.
The chlorination of ethane may be catalyzed by bringing the reacting gases into contact with
metal chlorides, or crystalline carbon. Photochemical chlorination is not used industrially.

OBJECTIVES

To install and converge a conversion reactor

To simulate a process involving reaction and separation
To use the Recycle operation in HYSYS

THEORY
LAB 5.1: PRODUCTION OF ETHYL CHLORIDE
Process:
One of the routes to produce ethyl chloride is by the gas-phase reaction of HCl with ethylene
over a copper chloride catalyst supported on silica:
C2H4 + HCl - C2H5Cl
In this process, the feed stream is composed of 50 mol% HCl, 48 mol% C 2H4 and 2 mol% N2
at 100 kmol/hr, at 25oC and 1 atm. Since the reaction only achieves 90 mol% conversion, the
ethyl chloride product is separated from the unreacted reagents and the latter are recycled.
The separation process is operated at atmospheric pressure and pressure drops are ignored. To
prevent the accumulation of inerts in the system, 10 kmol/hr is withdrawn in a purge stream.
Hints:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Use Peng-Robinson equation of state (Use SI unit)

Assumed no pressure drop in all equipment
Use the TEE model to split the distillate into purge stream and recycle stream
Always specify/guess the outlet stream of the Recycle, never the inlet
Specify the mole fraction of the outlet of the Recycle, equal to the mole fraction of the

feed with a flow rate of zero

6. Process flow as shown in the following diagram

Recycle
Purge

Feed

CATALYTIC
REACTOR

Distillation Column

Pure ethyl chloride

LAB 5.2: MAXIMIZING THE VENTURE PROFIT IN THE MANUFACTURE OF

ETHYL

CHLORIDE

Process:
The venture profit of the ethyl chloride process is maximized by adjusting the purge flow
rate. To estimate the venture profit, the following information is supplied:

Installed cost of equipment

500

330 x 24
( F R)
1000

0.6

units

Cost of ethylene

1.5 x 10-3 units/kg

Cost of HCl

1.0 x 10-3 units/kg

Revenue for ethyl chloride

2.5 x 10-3 units/kg

Where FR is the reactor feed rate in kg/hr. The venture profit is formulated (in monetary units)
assuming a 10% return on investment (ROI) and 330 operating days/year:
330 x 24
VP=330 x 24 [ 2.5 P( 1.5 X Et + X HCl ) F ]0.1 500
( FR )
1000

0.6

Where XEt and XHCl are the mass fractions of ethylene and HCl in the feed stream respectively
and F and P are the feed and product flow rates in kg/hr.
Hints:
1. Use Peng-Robinson fluid package ( Use SI unit)
2. Add component mass flow for ethylene and hydrogen chloride. Add mass flow for
reactor inlet and product of 100% ethyl chloride in the connections tab in the spread
sheet properties
3. Component mass flow for VP (nominal) and VP (low) are selected as variables
4. Add the spreadsheet to calculate the ethylene cost, hydrogen chloride cost, equipment
cost, ethyl chloride cost, VP (nominal) and VP (low)
Add formulation for on the spreadsheet tab into formula tab
6

PROCEDURE
1. From the File tab, a new case is opened and components are selected by clicking the
Add button.
2. By choosing ethylene, hydrochloric acid, ethyl chloride and nitrogen from the available
list in the library, the component is named as Component List 1.
3. Fluid Packages is clicked and Peng-Robinson equation of state is added as the Basis-1.
4. Then reaction is clicked. Conversion is chosen since this is the process of conversion and
also the stoichiometry coefficients were inserted according the reaction equations. At
Basis interface, the Co value was put as 90 since the question ask for 90% conversion of
ethylene. After finished, the Add to FP button was clicked so that the reaction set was
added to the fluid package.
5. Process Flow Diagram (PFD) for the case is created by clicking the Enter Simulation
Environment button.
6. Then the conversion reactor is added and the reaction set is picked. The initial condition
value of the feed stream was inserted (molar flowrate, temperature and pressure).
7. The conditions for outlet stream of were inserted.
8. After that, the distillation column (DC) was selected. All the specifications given are
inserted into DC spec.
9. The vapor outlet was created and so as the liquid outlet.
10. From the liquid outlet, TEE splitter is added.
11. TEE splitter splits the stream into 2 streams, purge and recycle stream.
12. At the recycle stream, recycle tool is added.
13. The outlet of recycle stream is mixed with feed stream by adding mixer.
14. Then from Tools, Databook is chosen.
15. In Databook, Case Study 1 is added and button Results is clicked.
16. From Results, the data of the simulation can be displayed by selecting Graph or Table.

RESULT
1. What is the mole fraction for each component at the effluent of the catalytic
reactor before recycle?
At vapour effluent, the mole fraction for each component is 0.084507, 0.119718,
0.760563 and 0.035211 for ethylene, HCL, CCl 2, and nitrogen respectively. As for
liquid effluent, the mole fraction for each component is 0.003062, 0.007207,
0.989565, and 0.00086 for ethylene, HCL, CCl2, and nitrogen respectively.

2. How to get 100% purity of ethyl chloride?

By adding a distillation column.

3. What is the flow rate of the recycle stream? (in kgmole/h)

The flow rate of recycle stream is 6.651 kgmole/h.

4. What is the flow rate of the final product stream after recycling? (after
separation process).
The flow rate of the final product stream after recycling is 45 kgmole/h.

CALCULATION

All calculations were made by HYSYSTM software.

DISCUSSION
8

This experiment is about the production ethyl chloride by the gas-phase reaction of
HCl with ethylene over a copper chloride catalyst on silica. The main objectives of this
experiment are to install and converge a conversion reactor, to simulate a process involving
reaction and separation and to use Recycle operation in HYSYS. In this process, 50 mol% of
HCl, 48 mol% of C2H4 and 2 mol% of N2 were fed at 100 kmol/hr and 1 atm. Peng-Robinson
equation of state was chosen as the fluid package and no pressure drop was assumed in all
equipment.
Then, the entire component is fed to a conversion reactor where 90% conversion was
achieved. Initially, the mole fraction for each component at the effluent of the catalytic
reactor is 0.084496 of ethylene, 0.119703 of HCl, 0.760468 of ethyl chloride and 0.035332 of
nitrogen. For this reaction, the conversion reached only 90%, so to achieve pure 100% ethyl
chloride; the ethyl chloride product must be separated from the unreacted reagents by using a
distillation column. Since the reaction is in vapour phase, the vapour effluent from the reactor
was fed to the distillation column.
For the distillation column, the condenser used was a partial condenser and the reflux
ratio is 4.98. The separation process was operated at atmospheric pressure and the pressure
drops were ignored because no pressure drops was assumed earlier. The method to achieved
100% production of ethyl chloride is by inserting the mole fraction of the components. So, at
the reboiler, mole fraction of HCl is set at 1.0 x 10 5 which is close to zero while at the
condenser, mole fraction of ethyl chloride is also set at 1.0 x 10 5 because there is no ethyl
chloride in the distillate.
The latter from the reaction must be recycled, so the distillate effluent of the
distillation column is recycled. After that, the stream was splitted into two streams by the
TEE model which are purge stream and recycle stream. The purge stream is to prevent the
accumulation of the inert in the system. The recycle stream has a flow rate of 6.645 kmole/hr
while the purge stream has a molar flow rate of 10 kmol/hr. The recycle stream is then joined
with a Recycle tool and the effluent was mix with the feed stream by using a mixer.

The second part of this experiment was about the usage of spreadsheet in HYSYS.
Spreadsheet mainly is used to calculate the maximum venture profit that can be obtained by
9

adjusting the purge flow rate. By inserting the appropriate values in the spreadsheet, the
maximum venture profit is calculated and a graph of Venture Profit (lb/hr) versus Purge Flow
Rate (lbmole/hr) is plotted. Based on the graph, the lowest venture profit is estimated at 9100
lb/hr which is at purge flow rate of 10 kmole/hr. As for the maximum venture profit that can
be obtained is at the flow rate of 7.5 kmole/hr with the venture profit value of 1.04 x 10 4
lb/hr.

CONCLUSION

As the conclusion, this laboratory work is successful. The conversion was

successfully installed and converged, a process involving reaction and separation was
simulated and the Recycle operation in HYSYS was used. The mole fraction for each
component at the effluent of the catalytic reactor is 0.084496 of ethylene, 0.119703 of HCl,
0.760468 of ethyl chloride and 0.035332 of nitrogen. On the other hand, the lowest venture
profit is estimated at 9100 lb/hr which is at purge flow rate of 10 kmole/hr. As for the
maximum venture profit that can be obtained is at the flow rate of 7.5 kmole/hr with the
venture profit value of 1.04 x 104 lb/hr.

RECOMMENDATION
In order to run the HYSYS software, students should follow the below:
10

Students should be fully understand the concept of the equipment used in HYSYS

Students should read properly and understand the manual laboratory before run the
HYSYS Software to solve the problem

Students should now familiar know using the HYSIS software

While inserting the value in the spreadsheet make sure that the value is correct so
justified answer can be obtained.

REFERENCE
1.
2.
3.
4.

www.engr.uky.edu/.../Simulation%20Laboratory%20-%20054330.pdf
www.studport.ch.pwr.wroc.pl/studport/files/1574
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chloroethane
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-ethyl-chloride.htm
5. http://www.scribd.com/doc/30133604/Ethyl-Chloride

11