Modelling and optimization of ethane recovery process from natural gas via ZIF-8/water-glycol slurry with low energy consumption

Ruihang Zhang, Zexin Wang, Xiaoming Wei, Xiaowan Peng, Wan Chen, Chun Deng, Bei Liu, Changyu Sun and Guangjin Chen

Energy, 2023, vol. 263, issue PA

Abstract: Effective recovery of ethane from natural gas plays an increasingly important role as ethane is a good raw material for ethylene production. The conventional cryogenic separation process (CryoPro) is energy intensive. Absorption-adsorption coupling separation process (SorbPro) using ZIF-8 slurry may be a more energy-efficient technique as its operating conditions are milder (i.e., 273.15 K, ∼1 MPa). This paper aims to conduct the process modelling and optimization of SorbPro for CH4/C2H6 separation. The equilibrium stage method is used to model the mass transfer units (absorption-adsorption column, desorber, etc) and the key process operating parameters are optimized simultaneously by genetic algorithm. The results show that the ethane mole fraction can be enriched from 22 mol% in the feed gas to 90.04 mol%, the ethane recovery ratio reaches 90.34%, and the energy consumption per Nm3 ethane is 0.6792 kW h/Nm3, which is 25.6% lower than that of the CryoPro (0.9128 kW h/Nm3). It indicates that the SorbPro may be a more promising approach for recovering ethane from natural gas.

Keywords: Natural gas; Light hydrocarbon recovery; Porous liquid; Process modelling; Optimization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:263:y:2023:i:pa:s0360544222025312

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2022.125645

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