2. INTRODUCTION
• Ethylene glycol was first prepared in 1859 by
the French chemist Charles-Adolphe Wurtz from ethylene glycol
diacetate via saponification with potassium hydroxide and, in 1860,
from the hydration of ethylene oxide.
• In the United States, semicommercial production of ethylene glycol
via ethylene chlorohydrin started in 1917. The first large-scale
commercial glycol plant was erected in 1925 at South Charleston,
West Virginia, by Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Co. (now Union
Carbide Corp.).
• Annual production of this compound is about 6.7 billion kilograms.
• The major uses are
o in the manufacture of polyethylene terephthalate
o as a heat transfer agent
3. VARIOUS INDUSTRIAL
METHODS process:
• Ethylene carbonate
Ethylene carbonate (intermediate) + Water → Ethylene glycol
• Halcon Acetoxylatin Process:
Ethylene + Acetic acid sol. → Ethylene glycol diacetate
Ethylene glycol diacetates (Hydrolysis) → Ethylene glycol + Acetic acid
• Union Carbide Syn Gas Process:
Syn Gas (Rhodium based catalyst) → Ethylene glycol + Glycerol + Propylene Oxide
• Hydrolysis of Ethylene Oxide (Preferred Method):
Ethylene Oxide + Water → Ethylene Glycol
This method is preferred in the industry because it shows high conversion values of ethylene oxide
(greater than 95 %). Maintaining a high value of water to ethylene oxide ratio guarantees high selectivity
w.r.t the desired product (Monoethylene Glycol).
4. CONCEPTS USED
• Material Balance
• Performance Equation
• Rate equations
• Multiple reactions
• Steady - state non-isothermal reactor design
5. ASSUMPTIONS
Following assumptions were made during the calculation
procedure
1. Flowrate of ethylene oxide = 1kg/sec
2. Excess of water - molar ratio of ethylene oxide to water =
1:20
3. Total conversion of ethylene oxide = 1
4. Conversion of ethylene oxide to MEG = 0.9
5. Conversion of ethylene oxide to DEG = 0.09
6. Conversion of ethylene oxide to TEG = 0.01
7. Delta (Cp) of reaction is 0
8. Ua = 4000 W/cubic-meters-K
9. CONCLUSIONS
• We studied and analyzed the production of ethylene
glycol on an industrial scale. The concepts of non-
isothermal reactor design were used with great effect in
the project.
• The principle of selectivity in multiple reactions was
encountered and its effect on the hampering of production
of the desired chemical understood. The parameters of
the reaction were accordingly modified to give maximum
output of the desired product.
• Coupled differential equations were solved using
PolyMath to obtain the temperature profile
• with conversion. The outlet temperature and reactor
volume were obtained from the plot.
10. REFERENCES
The following references were used in making the project -
– http://sbioinformatics.com/design_thesis - used to obtain the
reaction data for conversion of ethylene oxide to MEG, DEG, and
TEG
– Perry’s Chemical Engineering Handbook - used to obtain the
dependence of specific rate constant with respect to temperature
– Fogler, 3rd Edition - concepts of non-isothermal series-parallel
reactions and PolyMath basics
– www.polymath-software.com - help manual, used to debug code
