Novel retrofit designs using a modified coordinate descent methodology for improving energy efficiency of natural gas liquid fractionation process

摘要: Abstract Tough environmental regulations, intense competition, expensive fossil energy use, and the strong growth predictions of natural gas market have prompted efforts to retrofit existing purification processes reduce their requirements. The important goals design are analyze, evaluate propose suitable technologies improve efficiency and/or increase capacity. This paper reports results a techno-economic feasibility study liquid (NGL) fractionation process. A novel hybrid system, side reboiler heat pump-assisted, thermally-coupled distillation sequence maximize efficiency, was proposed. Fractional utilization area used as hydraulic performance indicator determine if bottleneck occurs in design. modified coordinate descent methodology employed solve optimization problem. As result, successful finding optimal proposed structure operating variables, which resulted cost savings 44.55% compared representative base case. short payback period 14 months reduced CO 2 emissions up 42.05% showed that is an attractive option for retrofitting industrial implementation. can be both grass-root designs. also even pump requirements significantly, may higher exergy loss than conventional columns.