TY - JOUR
T1 - Tackling increased CO2 concentration in feeds for existing acid gas removal units
T2 - A simulation study based on a customized CO2 kinetics model
AU - Adegunju, Sulaimon A.
AU - Awad, Maram R.
AU - Berrouk, Abdallah S.
AU - Dara, Satyadileep
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, © 2018 Taylor & Francis.
PY - 2018/9/2
Y1 - 2018/9/2
N2 - A Middle East-based amine sweetening unit, with an overall capacity of about 2.2 BSCFD of gas, is among the world’s largest process plants and currently processes sour gas with 10 mol% of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and carbon dioxide (CO2) put together. Current expectation is that acid gas contents in the feed may increase beyond the design limit of the plant. The present work is an effort to quantify the effects of the feed gas CO2 increase on the plant and to proffer solutions to handle these effects efficiently. We revised the kinetics of amine-based CO2 absorption correlation of an existing model using real-data-driven parameters re-estimation. Evolutionary technique that employs particle swarm optimization algorithm is used for this purpose. The new CO2 kinetic model is inserted in a first-principle process simulator, ProMax® V4.0, in order to analyze various solutions necessary to mitigate the operational challenges due to increased feed CO2. The process plant with present design and operating conditions is determined to handle up to 8.45 mol% CO2 contents in the sour gas feed. Further results revealed that methyldiethanolamine, diethanolamine, and dimethyl ether propylene glycol (DEPG) could not handle this high feed CO2 challenge, even at maximum (design) steam and solvent usage. However, diglycolamine exclusively renders the solution as it treats high CO2 feed gas efficiently with allowable utility consumption, while satisfying the constraints imposed by product gas specifications.
AB - A Middle East-based amine sweetening unit, with an overall capacity of about 2.2 BSCFD of gas, is among the world’s largest process plants and currently processes sour gas with 10 mol% of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and carbon dioxide (CO2) put together. Current expectation is that acid gas contents in the feed may increase beyond the design limit of the plant. The present work is an effort to quantify the effects of the feed gas CO2 increase on the plant and to proffer solutions to handle these effects efficiently. We revised the kinetics of amine-based CO2 absorption correlation of an existing model using real-data-driven parameters re-estimation. Evolutionary technique that employs particle swarm optimization algorithm is used for this purpose. The new CO2 kinetic model is inserted in a first-principle process simulator, ProMax® V4.0, in order to analyze various solutions necessary to mitigate the operational challenges due to increased feed CO2. The process plant with present design and operating conditions is determined to handle up to 8.45 mol% CO2 contents in the sour gas feed. Further results revealed that methyldiethanolamine, diethanolamine, and dimethyl ether propylene glycol (DEPG) could not handle this high feed CO2 challenge, even at maximum (design) steam and solvent usage. However, diglycolamine exclusively renders the solution as it treats high CO2 feed gas efficiently with allowable utility consumption, while satisfying the constraints imposed by product gas specifications.
KW - CO capture
KW - CO kinetics
KW - di-glycol-amine
KW - Gas sweetening
KW - methyl-di-ethanolamine
KW - process simulation technology
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85042940258&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/01496395.2018.1443129
DO - 10.1080/01496395.2018.1443129
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85042940258
SN - 0149-6395
VL - 53
SP - 2004
EP - 2015
JO - Separation Science and Technology (Philadelphia)
JF - Separation Science and Technology (Philadelphia)
IS - 13
ER -