Cleaner Production Assessment of Fast Bordeaux GP Base

Abstract

The pilot plant study of cleaner production (CP) process of a dyes intermediate, Fast Bordeaux GP Base (2-nitro-p-anisidine), is presented in this work. The existing production process with acetic anhydride as raw material generates highly polluting (high chemical oxygen demand), huge-volume effluent, and thus the treatment is expensive. In the proposed process, raw material acetic anhydride in acetylation step is replaced with acetic acid. The reaction conditions like reaction time (3 h), temperature (120∘C) and molar ratio of p-anisidine and acetic acid (1 : 3.58) are optimized in the laboratory scale and implemented in pilot plant. The extent of conversion has been monitored by nitrite value test, and purity of product mixture is measured with thin-layer chromatography (TLC). The acidic wastewater quantity is dramatically reduced by incorporating recycling in washing scheme, and thus water consumption is reduced. Reduction in wastewater generation and reduction/elimination of treatment cost is also observed. Chemical oxygen demand (COD) of the effluent stream is reduced by the recovery of by-products sodium acetate and spent acid. The technoeconomical feasibility studies show that the proposed CP options are highly economical and environmental friendly.