Question

A water solution containing 0.005 mole fraction of benzoic acid is to be extracted using pure benzene as the solvent. If the feed rate is 100 mol/h and the solvent rate is 10 mol/h, find the number of equilibrium stages required to reduce the concentration of benzoic acid in the aqueous solution to 0.0001 mole fraction. Operation is isothermal at 280 k (water and benzene are insoluble at this temperature), where the equilibrium data can be represented as (wankat, 1988) mole fraction of benzoic acid in water = 0.0446 x (mole fraction of benzoic acid in benzene)

Answer 1

A water solution containing 0.005 mole fraction of benzoic acid is to be extracted using pure benzene as the solvent. If the feed rate is 100 mol/h and the solvent rate is 10 mol/h, find the number of equilibrium stages required to reduce the concentration of benzoic acid in the aqueous solution to 0.0001 mole fraction. Operation is isothermal at 280 k (water and benzene are insoluble at this temperature), where the equilibrium data can be represented as (wankat, 1988) mole fraction of benzoic acid in water = 0.0446 x (mole fraction of benzoic acid in benzene)