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US 4,806,136 AGranted
Air separation method with integrated gas turbine
AssigneeUnion Carbide Corporation
InventorsDonna F. Kiersz, Karen D. Parysek
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An air separation method employing compression powered by a gas turbine and employing four heat regenerable adsorbent purifiers wherein two purifiers are used to purify feed air while a third purifier is being regenerated by hot regeneration gas and a fourth purifier is being cooled so as to be ready to purify feed air.
Claims23
A method for purifying feed air for separation in an air separation facility comprising:
- (a) compressing feed air;
- (b) cooling the compressed feed air;
- (c) passing a first portion of the cooled, compressed feed air through a first purifier containing heat regenerable adsorbent, and a second portion of the cooled, compressed feed air through a second purifier containing heat regenerable adsorbent, wherein the first and second portions are substantially cleaned of impurities by transfer of the impurities to the adsorbent;
- (d) introducing the cleaned first and second portions into an air separation facility as feed air;
- (e) separating the feed air in the air separation facility into nitrogen-rich and oxygen-rich components;
- (f) warming a first part of the nitrogen-rich component;
- (g) passing the warmed first part through a third purifier containing heat regenerable adsorbent which contains impurities so as to transfer those impurities to the warmed part and thus clean the adsorbent;
- (h) passing a second part of the nitrogen-rich component through a fourth purifier containing clean, warm, heat regenerable adsorbent to cool the adsorbent;
- (i) expanding the resulting first and second parts through an expansion turbine for the production of external work;
- and
- (j) employing at least a portion of said external work to compress the feed air of step (a).
8 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.