Effects of sweating time and cooling strategy on purification of N-vinyl-2-pyrrolidinone using a melt crystallizer

Abstract

A melt crystallization process is proposed to produce high-purity n-vinyl-2-pyrrolidinone (NVP). To produce high purity products, operation strategy plays key role in the melt crystallizer. We investigated the cooling strategy and optimal sweating time using a batch-type melt crystallizer. A slow cooling followed by a slow heating was found to be an effective temperature profile to produce high purity of NVP. The optimal sweating time was found to be about 20 minutes. For industrial application, a cascade melt crystallizer which consists of four stages was constructed and the proposed crystallization/sweating scheme was applied. Using the new melt crystallizer, NVP more than 99.99% purity can be produced in semi-continuous mode.