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US 4,421,939 AGranted
Production of ethanol from acetic acid
AssigneeUnion Carbide Corporation
InventorsBen W. Kiff, David J. Schreck
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Ethanol is produced from acetic acid by esterifying the acetic acid with an olefin having at least 4 carbon atoms, hydrogenating the ester obtained into ethanol and a higher alcohol having at least 4 carbon atoms, removing the ethanol, dehydrating the higher alcohol back to the original olefin and recycling the olefin to esterify the acetic acid.
Claims6
Method of producing ethanol from acetic acid which comprises the steps:
- (1) contacting acetic acid with an olefinically unsaturated hydrocarbon having about 4 to about 10 carbon atoms, in the presence of a catalytic amount of an acidic esterification catalyst whereby an ester is obtained;
- (2) hydrogenating the ester from step (1) whereby a mixture of ethanol and a higher alcohol containing the same number of carbons as the olefinically unsaturated hydrocarbon from step (1) is obtained;
- (3) separating the mixture of step (2) by fractional distillation into ethanol and the higher boiling alcohol;
- (4) recovering the ethanol;
- (5) dehydrating the higher boiling alcohol into the original olefinically unsaturated hydrocarbon used in step (1);
- and
- (6) recycling the olefinically unsaturated hydrocarbon from step (5) with fresh acetic acid back to step (1) to repeat the process of esterification.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.