(700e) Central Composite Design for the Modeling of the Glycolic Acid Reactive Extraction

The development of an industrial process requires study of the effect of various operating parameters which can be achieved by exhaustive experimentation. The experiments are carried out by varying numerous experimental units to evaluate the performance of the system in terms of single/many output variable (s). These experimental data are useful to draw many valuable results and inferences about the system and the process. Therefore, an experimenter needs to plan and design the experiments, and analyze the results. Central composite design is applied for the construction of empirical models based on experimental design and data. The developed model is then used to estimate the optimum of the process variables (parameters) to maximize or minimize the dependent variable. This method is widely applied for the modeling and optimization of separation processes for the extraction of various compounds from different liquid and solid phases. The equilibrium reactive extraction of glycolic acid from aqueous solution is studied using tri-n-octylamine (TOA) as extractant dissolved in organic solvents (MIBK). Experimental studies are designed considering central composite design method to investigate the main and interaction effects of initial acid concentration in the aqueous phase (C_in, mol/L), initial amine composition in the organic phase ( , %v/v) and temperature (^oC) on the degree of extraction, Y (%). The developed model is then used to find out optimum process parameters of reactive extraction.