Converting natural gas to dimethyl ether
AssigneeSaudi Arabian Oil Company
InventorsGuodong Zhan, Bodong Li, Abdulwahab S. Aljohar
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Abstract
A system and method for converting natural gas to dimethyl ether (DME) are provided. An exemplary system includes a purified natural gas feed, a combustion chamber to combust a first portion of the natural gas to provide heat and an exhaust gas, and a separator to separate water and CO2 from the exhaust gas to form a first feed, a second portion of the natural gas forms a second feed. The system also includes a bi-reforming reactor comprising a bi-reforming catalyst to react the first feed and the second feed to form hydrogen and carbon monoxide, and a dimethyl ether (DME) reactor comprising a DME catalyst to form DME from the hydrogen and carbon monoxide.
Claims15
A method for converting natural gas to dimethyl ether, comprising:
- dividing a natural gas feed to form a first process feed stream and a second process feed stream;
- combusting the first process feed stream to provide heat for a bi-reforming reaction, and forming an exhaust stream;
- separating water and carbon dioxide from the exhaust stream, forming a stoichiometry adjustment stream;
- feeding the second process feed stream and the stoichiometry adjustment stream to a pre-reforming reaction, forming a pre-reformed effluent stream;
- feeding the pre-reformed effluent stream to a bi-reforming reaction, forming a metgas effluent stream;
- feeding the metgas effluent stream to a DME reaction, forming a DME effluent stream;
- and
- passing the DME effluent stream through a water absorber to form an aqueous DME solution, wherein the bi-reforming reaction and the DME reaction are conducted in the presence of a catalyst supported on a catalyst support comprising an alumina layer formed by:
- treating a catalyst support comprising hydroxyl groups with an excess of trimethyl alumina to form a layer over the catalyst support comprising methyl groups;
- and
- treating the catalyst support comprising the methyl groups with water to form the catalyst support comprising an alumina layer.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.