The Reversible Separation of Multicomponent Mixtures

Abstract

In the chapter on “Fundamental Concepts” of his “Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics,” Professor Barnett F. Dodge has clearly emphasized the importance of the concept of the Reversible Process:

The reversible process is one that gives the maximum accomplishment i.e., yields the greatest amount of work or requires the least work to bring about a given change. It tells us the maximum efficiency toward which we may strive but which we never expect to equal. Without such an absolute standard or yardstick, the attempts of engineers to improve processes would be purely shots in the dark with no goal at which to aim. With the reversible process as our standard, we know at once whether an actual process is already highly efficient or whether it is very inefficient and therefore capable of considerable improvement.