Much work is aimed at the improvements in the manufacture and recovery of alcohol, where the primary consideration is with

the energy consumption in the distilleries. By energy re-use, pressure cascading and waste heat recovery the expenditure of the energy in distillation can be greatly reduced. Over the past two decades, many series of highly efficient alcohol distillation systems have been developed. These systems have been developed in order to recover various grades of ethyl alcohol from synthetic and fermentation feed stock. The primary goal of these systems is to minimize the energy consumption. FACTORS AFFECTING THE ENERGY USE: Energy usage increases when there is less alcohol in feed stream (or) when product concentration is raised. There is a trade off between energy usage and the column length. Degree to which the feed is preheated also affects the energy usage. The preheating must be done using the feed as cooling fluid in condenser (or) by using heat exchangers. Energy usage: 1. Use of common condenser and decanter for the dehydration and stripping towers. This reduces the capital cost. 2. Design of highly efficient tower trays for high turn down capability. 3. Consumption of entraining agents (less than 0.1kg/1000lt of alcohol). 4. Usage of steam (1-1.5kg/ltr.) or equivalent hot condensate (or) waste streams. In order to prevent the energy wastage in distillation plants, multi pressure distillation plants can be employed. These plants have following advantages: 1. Lower steam consumption 2. Lower scale formation 3. Reduced by-product formation in the mash column.

Distillation columns could be operated on a similar principle of multiple effect evaporators to save energy. Here, usually the column is operated under vacuum and is heated by overhead alcohol vapours from rectifying column. Thus, the steam applied to column can be saved. Using this concept of multiple effect evaporators nearly 50% of energy can be saved. HOW TO MINIMIZE THE ENERGY CONSUMPTION?? The falling film type evaporators can be used as re-boilers in the distillation column which support the rapid start up and shut down of the column. It is easily controlled and suited to operate with the smallest temperature difference. These can be used mainly for temperature response process and saving energy. To minimize the energy consumption: Routine replacement of economizers, heat exchangers and coolers must be done. This in-turn reduces the energy demand. Utilize variable speed drivers on large motors to reduce the energy demand. The size of the boilers used in the plant must be reduced. By reducing the size of boiler, the amount of heat actually supplied to the boiler reduces. Prior to distillation, the feed is required to be preheated. This preheating must be done using the feed as a cooling fluid in condenser where it can get heated by the heat transfer from the alcohol vapours. After distillation process, the alcohol vapours produced are at around 100c which need to be cooled down and condensed. This can be done by passing the vapour through a heat exchanger where water is the cooling media. Due to heat transfer the vapours get condensed and turn to liquid and the cold water gets heated. Similarly, if we want to heat the WASH, we can directly send it to the heat exchanger where it can act as cooling medium and condense the vapour and in-turn gets heated. This helps in saving the energy required for heating the WASH. The flue gasses release from the top of distillation column can be used by sending to a pre-heater. This pre-heater contains coils, in which the water at room temperature can

be kept. As the flue gasses pass through the coils, due to heat transfer, the water in the coils get heated and in turn can be used in boilers. This helps in saving enormous amounts of energy. Distillation is a very inefficient process from a thermodynamic point of view. Here heat is supplied to boil the mixture of liquids where most of the heat is released at lower temperature level during condensation. This heat of condensation can be reused at same column if the temperature level of heat can be increased to the desired level. This can be done by the use of heat pumps. Many different heat pumps are available in the market, out of which thermo-acoustic heat pumps can be efficiently used to lift the temperature at a higher level.