Shortcut Method for Initialization of Dividing Wall Columns and Estimating Pareto-Optimal NQ-curves

In early project stages often no simulation results are available for dividing wall columns. Hence, shortcut methods are used to estimate suitable vapor and liquid splits. In a previous paper it was shown that Vmin diagrams are a suited tool to satisfy this need. However, it has turned out that it shows weaknesses for columns with finite or non-optimal stages. This contribution closes that gap and presents an extended approach to derive suited initial guesses. For this purpose, the original Vmin diagram is combined with a heuristic approach to calculate Pareto-optimal column designs resulting in a stage-adapted Vmin diagram. A comparative study shows that the new approach is a powerful tool to generate reliable guesses for multiple dividing wall column simulations with finite stage numbers.