4. Single distillation

During this operation, heat is applied to split a binary liquid mixture into a liquid and a vapor.

Equilibrium is assumed between the two phases. In particular, pressure and temperature are identical. Figure 3 illustrates a continuous operation of this type: X _I , X _L , Y _V are the molar fractions in A of the feed, liquid and vapor mixtures respectively, and I, L and V are the molar flow rates of these same mixtures. By convention, A is the most volatile component.