Design and optimization of large-scale natural gas liquefaction process based on triple refrigeration cycles

Liming Pu, Yingjie Xiong, Ke Wang, Lin Tang, Limin Qiu and Kai Wang

Energy, 2024, vol. 313, issue C

Abstract: In large-scale natural gas liquefaction, minimizing specific energy consumption has consistently been a primary objective. This study aims to develop a large-scale natural gas liquefaction process that balances energy efficiency and cost-effectiveness, presenting a viable option for industrial production. By employing a refrigerant strategy of “propane + mixed refrigerant + mixed refrigerant”, a novel large-scale natural gas liquefaction process based on triple refrigeration cycles (TRC) is proposed. To address the challenge of boil-off gas (BOG) re-liquefaction, the TRC process is further refined to integrate BOG re-liquefaction (TRC-BR). Thermodynamic models are built for the proposed TRC and TRC-BR processes, as well as the propane pre-cooled mixed refrigerant (C3MR) and AP-X processes as baseline cases. Global optimization is conducted using the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm, with the specific power consumption (SPC) serves as the objective function. The results reveal that the SPC of the TRC and TRC-BR processes are 0.2726 and 0.2704 kWh/kg-LNG respectively. Compared with the C3MR and AP-X processes, the SPC of the TRC decrease by 1.54% and 4.84%, respectively. The total investments for the TRC and TRC-BR processes are estimated at a similar level compared to the baseline cases, demonstrating their significant potential for industrial application.

Keywords: Liquefied natural gas; LNG; Triple refrigeration cycles; BOG re-liquefaction; Particle swarm optimization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036054422403528X
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:313:y:2024:i:c:s036054422403528x

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2024.133750

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().