MAXIMUM PARTIAL AREA RULE FOR PHASE-EQUILIBRIUM CALCULATIONS

Eubank and Hall have shown recently that the tangent-line criterion re duces to an equal area construction for the derivative of the total Gi bbs energy plotted against composition. This paper presents another cr iterion along with a thermodynamic proof, the maximum partial area rul e (MPAR), which establishes an area on the plot of the derivative of t he Gibbs energy with respect to composition which is always a maximum at equilibrium. The method based upon this criterion is especially pow erful for complex phase equilibria involving multiple components and p hases.