Patent ID: 8314266

Claim:
A method for manufacturing ester from acid and alcohol, comprising the steps of: (a) extracting a first mixture having acid and alcohol from a reactive distillation column and feeding the first mixture into at least a sidestream reactor packed with a catalyst in order to obtain a reaction product; (b) feeding the reaction product from the sidestream reactor to the reactive distillation column so as to separate a second mixture having alcohol, ester and water from the top end of the reactive distillation column; (c) feeding the second mixture to a decanter to separate an organic phase from an aqueous solvent; and (d) separating the ester from the organic phase, wherein the bottom end of the reactive distillation column is free from being packed with the catalyst, and the flow rate of the first mixture extracted from the reactive distillation column and fed to the sidestream reactor is 3 to 4 times higher than the recovery rate of the organic phase recycled to the reactive distillation column.