Separation technologies: Marketing factors. Final report.

摘要

The chemical and petroleum industries consume approximately 5.8 quads per year of energy. Within these industries, 43% of the energy is used by separation processes to recover and purify products. With 40,000 distillation columns in operation, distillation is used to make 95% of all separations in these two industries. Although separations are identified which are amenable to advanced separation technologies (that make distillation more energy-efficient), they are not implemented because of commercial barriers. The focus of this work was on barriers which can by overcome by implementing advanced separation-related technologies. Barriers were screened and prioritized, and Return On Investment (ROI) was calculated for each project designed to overcome a high priority barrier. Economic analyses were based on specific separations such as ethylene-ethane, propylene-propane, ethyl benzene-styrene, and ethanol-water. These separations were selected because they consume significant amounts of energy for separation. Thus, conclusions are based on a limited number of case studies; an approach necessary to complete this project within a reasonable time frame. Recommended projects are discussed and summarized. (ERA citation 17:028581)