Method and apparatus for vaporizing a liquid
AssigneeL'Air Liquide, Societe Anonyme pour l'Etude et l'Exploitation des Procedes Georges Claude
InventorsAurelie Luong, Bhadri Prasad
Life of this patent
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Abstract
In a method for vaporizing a liquid in a heat exchanger, a liquid vaporizes in the heat exchanger to form a gas which is sent to a user via a first pipe in normal operation, wherein if the rate of change of the rate of flow of liquid sent to the exchanger exceeds a threshold, the first pipe is closed and fluid, which may be gas vaporized in the heat exchanger and/or liquid not vaporized in the exchanger, is discharged into the atmosphere or to a flare stack through a second pipe and a valve, the opening of the valve being regulated by the fluid flow rate measured in the second pipe.
Claims7
A method for vaporizing a liquid in a heat exchanger in which a liquid vaporizes in the heat exchanger to form a gas which is sent to a user via a first pipe in normal operation, wherein if the rate of change of the rate of flow of liquid sent to the exchanger exceeds a threshold, the first pipe is closed and fluid is discharged into the atmosphere or to a flare stack through a second pipe and a valve, the opening of the valve being regulated by the fluid flow rate measured in the second pipe.
An apparatus for vaporizing a liquid comprising:
- a heat exchanger fluidically connected to an inlet pipe configured to carry a liquid to be vaporized, and a first pipe configured to carry a vaporized liquid,
- a second pipe fluidically connected to the first pipe, and configured to send gas vaporized in the heat exchanger and/or liquid not vaporized in the heat exchanger to the atmosphere or to a flare stack,
- a first detector fluidically connected to the inlet pipe and configured to detect a rate of change of the rate of flow of liquid sent to the exchanger, and detect if this rate of flow exceeds a threshold,
- a second detector fluidically connected to the second pipe and configured to detect the flowrate in the second pipe,
- a flow rate controller fluidically connected to the second pipe and configured to regulate the opening of a valve in the second pipe according to the flow rate measured by the second detector,
- a pressure controller fluidically connected to the first pipe and configured to measure the pressure in the second pipe and to regulate the opening of the valve in the second pipe according to the measured pressure, and
- a selector functionally connected to the valve and configured to allow the valve to be connected selectively to the flow rate controller and to the pressure controller.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.