Pressure-Regulated Melting of Solids with Warm Fluids

A method for melting solids comprising:

• passing solids through a solids inlet into a vessel, wherein the vessel comprises the solids inlet, a warm fluids inlet, a cavity, and a fluid outlet, and wherein the cavity has an internal pressure;
• passing a warm liquid through the warm fluids inlet at an inlet pressure;
• inducing a backpressure on the solids in the solids inlet by the inlet pressure provided by passing the warm liquid through the warm fluids inlet;
• matching a feed rate of the warm liquid to a feed rate of the solids such that the solids are melted directly to a product liquid at the internal pressure;
• restricting the fluid outlet such that the internal pressure is maintained in the cavity;
• and
• bleeding the product liquid out the fluid outlet past the restriction.