A new bi-directional reactive distillation dividing wall column process is developed for the purification of lactic acid through replacing a traditional reactive distillation column with a reactive dividing wall column.The process is optimized via sensitivity analysis and genetic algorithms.Compared to the traditional reactive distillation process,the optimized reactive distillation dividing wall column process reduces the total annual cost by 10.15%and CO2 emission rate by 31.75%,and improves lactic acid yield by 4.68%.