Design of heat integrated distillation systems for a light ends separation

Abstract

Paper presented at the 7th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Turkey, 19-21 July, 2010.

This paper presents an industrial case-study: the synthesis of heat-integrated distillation systems applied to the light ends separation section of olefin and gas process plants. The distillation systems presented in this work employ heat­integration principles to significantly reduce the heat requirements compared to the traditional simple column train. The work started from the simulation of the existing plant, by which the parameters of the system were identified. Then the possible sequences of simple columns with sharp splits were identified for the considered application, and all columns of the configurations were designed and the heat-integrated configuration was also considered. In order to verify the examined distillation systems, all simple and complex configurations were simulated by rigorous numerical models. On the basis of the numerical simulations, the energy requirements for each configuration were evaluated. A rating of different plants was then performed, based on the total annual cost, allowing identifying the best plant configuration. A heat­integrated configuration showed the best performances for then considered separation.