Study of Mixed Refrigerant Natural Gas Liquefaction Process Using a Mixture of Non-Flammable Refrigerants

摘要

Many small scale capacity natural gas liquefaction plants are based on mixed refrigerant cycles withhydrocarbons as a working fluid. Replacing hydrocarbons with non-flammable gases as a refrigerant maysignificantly improve the safety of operation and reduce the cost of equipment. The objective is to compareliquefaction cycles on hydrocarbon and non-flammable refrigerant. Mathematical modelling of the natural gasliquefaction process on the basis of a single-stage cycle with a phase separator based on hydrocarbon and nonflammablemixed refrigerants is made. The analysis of efficiency of the investigated cycles is made.Description of setup and experimental procedure is given. The results obtained can serve as a first step to thecreation of reliable tools for the analysis of processes based on mixtures of non-flammable refrigerants and thesubsequent practical development of this technology.