SUMMARY
In the present paper, a computational systematic procedure for isothermal Reactor Network Synthesis (RNS) is presented. A superstructure of ideal CSTR and PFR reactors is proposed and the model is formulated as a constrained Nonlinear Programming (NLP) problem. Complex reactions (series/parallel reactions) are considered. The objective function is based on yield or selectivity, depending on the desired product, subject to different operational conditions. The problem constraints are mass balances in the reactors and in the considered reactor network superstructure. A systematic computational procedure is proposed and a Genetic Algorithm (GA) is developed to obtain the optimal reactor arrangement with the maximum yield or selectivity and minimum reactor volume. Results are as good as or better than those reported in the literature.