Process and Apparatus for Xenon and or Krypton Recovery

Abstract

Recovering xenon and/or krypton from a feed gas can include utilization of a purge stream from a separation column positioned and configured to output at least one stream of fluid that is substantially nitrogen and at least one stream of fluid that is substantially oxygen. The purge stream can be split so that a first portion of the purge stream is fed as a liquid adjacent to a top of a purge treatment column and a second portion of the purge stream can be fed to a heat exchanger for superheating the second portion to feed a superheated vapor at or adjacent to a bottom of the purge treatment column. The purge treatment column can output a liquid stream that has a relatively high concentration of Xe and/or Kr therein as a feed stream for an Xe and/or Kr recovery system.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.