Supplemental air supply for an air separation system
AssigneeAir Products and Chemicals, Inc.
InventorsArthur Ramsden Smith, Donald Winston Woodward, William Curtis Kottke
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Pressurized byproduct gas from an air separation system is work expanded and the resulting work is used to compress supplemental feed air which is combined with a main feed air stream to supply a total air feed to the air separation system. Supplemental air can be provided only during off-design operation when the main feed air stream is insufficient to provide the total air feed to the system. Alternatively, supplemental air can be used continuously in combination with a reduced main feed air stream to provide total feed air to the system.
Claims21
A method for the separation of air which comprises:
- (a) providing a compressed air feed stream;
- (b) separating the compressed air feed stream in an air separation system to yield at least one product stream enriched in a constituent of air and at least one byproduct stream depleted in that constituent;
- and
- (c) operating the air separation system during a time period by
- (c1) providing at least a portion of the compressed air feed stream by a main compressed air stream and
- (c2) during at least part of the time period, compressing additional air to yield a supplemental compressed air stream which provides a portion of the compressed air feed stream, wherein at least a portion of the work for compressing the additional air is provided by work expansion of the byproduct stream from the air separation system.
A method for the separation of air which comprises:
- (a) providing a compressed air feed stream by compressing air in a multiple-stage centrifugal air compressor;
- (b) separating the compressed air feed stream in an air separation system to yield at least one product stream enriched in a constituent of air and at least one byproduct stream depleted in that constituent;
- and
- (c) work expanding the byproduct stream from the air separation system in a turboexpander and utilizing the resulting work to provide a portion of the work required to drive each stage of the multiple-stage air compressor;
- wherein each stage of the multiple-stage centrifugal air compressor is mechanically linked to a rotating driver;
- wherein the work required to drive each stage of the multiple-stage centrifugal compressor is provided in part by the rotating driver and in part by the turboexpander;
- and wherein the rotating driver is mechanically linked to the turboexpander such that the rotating driver and the turboexpander rotate at different speeds.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.