Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Limited

Mitsubishi Chemical Corporation

Hiroaki Shimazu

Kazuto Kobayashi

Yoshio Seiki

Noritaka Matsumoto

Hiroyuki Osora

Yoshiyuki Takeuchi

Keiichi Akimoto

Motoki Numata

A separation system has a distillation column, an overhead vapor supply pipe connected to the top of the distillation column, first and second branch pipes branching from the overhead vapor supply pipe and a superheater connected to the first branch pipe. A separator downstream of the superheater has a separation membrane for separating overhead vapor from the top of the distillation column into permeable vapor and nonpermeable vapor by allowing only a selected portion of the overhead vapor to permeate the separation membrane. A reflux unit has a condenser connected to the second branch pipe for cooling a portion of the overhead vapor into a liquid and a gas-liquid separator for separating gas from the liquid produced by cooling and returning the separated liquid into the top of the distillation column.

Separator for producing aromatic carboxylic acids

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Matsuyama, Japan

Hiroaki Shimazu