Oxygen Plant

Special Thanks to
Mr. Imtiaz Ahmed Awan Engr. Hasan Aslam Engr. M Ismail
38

Oxygen Plant:Introduction:Oxygen Plant is another important unit of Pakistan Still Mill is consist of two identical air separation units supplied & designed by M/S Air Liquid, France in 1982 & 1983 . In oxygen plant mainly distillation of air is done to produce two main products: Oxygen ( liquid & gaseous ) . Nitrogen ( liquid & gaseous ) . Gaseous Nitrogen & Oxygen produced at oxygen plant are supplied to all production units & shop through network of pipelines. Major portion of oxygen in Steel Making Department (86%) where oxygen is used for blowing of converter in steel making process. Gaseous nitrogen is mainly used as shielding & purging gas at CRM & T.P.P& T.B.S . At COBP, nitrogen is also used as inert gas at Coke Dry Quenching Plant. Gaseous oxygen & Nitrogen produced at Oxygen plant are supplied to all production units & shops through the network of pipelines. In addition both gases are also supplied in cylinders, to facilitate the work where pipeline network is not available.The plant process & machine parameters like pressure, flow, level & purity etc are controlled & monitored in control room by an effective & relaiable instrumentation & automation control system. The distributrion of gaseous oxygen & nitrogen is controlled through Expansion Devices. Both units are required to operate continuously for 2-3 years before being stoped for capital maintainence. During shut down of any unit due to capital maintenance or break down, production is reduced by 50 %. Though plant is equipped with World's best machine but it may be called as poor design from view point of operational flexibility. Initially it was having single inlet & outlet or industrial & sea water. Moreover, only one pump was provided for Nitrogen tower. Only stopping both units simultaneously could carry out valves & pipelines. For example both units were stopped for 11 & 12 day in
39

1984 & 1987 and now no common shut down is required on account of repair of sweater & industrial water pipelines. In addition indusrial water from alternative source was connected to all main equipment VIZ Air compressors, oxygen compresses, Nitrogen compressors and Turbines. However short common maintainence on the gaseous & liquid oxygen & nitrogen pipelines. Oxygen plant was wrongly designed for operation at 27 C ambient temperature of Air. During summer, the plant production was reduced by 10% to 15%. In order to ensure full production in summer, temperature, turbines & Nitrogen tower were modified during capital maintenance in 1987. Now the plant is capable to give production as per design. In spite of all above modifications, Oxygen plant is till under high risk because its main is not having standby arrangement. During capital maintenance due to stoppage of one unit production is reduced to 50% which adversely effect the Production at S.M.D. These production losses can be considerably reduced by adding one Stand by air compressor which will also cover the risk of stoppage of plant due to breakdown of any of existing air compressors. However, adiiton of third air separation unit is necessary to avoid all losses which may occur due to some braeak down or routine capital maintainence. Moreever simultaneous blowing of two convetorts will be possible for increasing production at S.M.D.

Process Description:Distillation process of air to produce oxygen and nitrogen is consist of following operations:-

Filteration Of Air:First of all air is entered into the fiteration room by the suction of compressor. Air is first pass through rolled type filter which remove particles of about 10 microns from the air, now air is passed through Pad type filter to remove the remaining particles of size about 5 microns from the air .

Compression:40

Air after filteration enters into the isothermal compressor the entering temperature of the air is 27 C at a pressure of 1.0132 bar with a flow rate of 45,000 cu.m/hr. The air compressor rotates at the rate of 9138 rpm , here the air is compressed in four different stages after compression in each section the air is cooled by industrial water. After compression and passing through final gas cooler the pressure of the air is 5.5 bar and having temperature 27C.

Reversing Heat Exchanger:After cooling down in final cooler , air is introduced into the reversible heat exchangers , which are divided into two cycles each having two cold cores and two warm cores working simultaneously and alternative in version it is performing two functions , as a purifier and as a exchanger. First function to purify the water and mainly CO2 impurities and second function minimizes the temperature near dew point. This part is also divided in heat cycle exchanger and cold cycle exchanger in first part average temperature becomes -99 to -110 C and in second part due to heat exchange the leaving air have -175 C temperature. The heat exchange is mainly done b/w entering warm air and leaving waste cooled nitrogen which is coming at -175 C. The path of waste nitrogen and warm air is inter-changed by callipered valve after each seven minute. The waste nitrogen takes CO2 and water which was left in the pipeline to the waste nitrogen tank giving all temperature to the warm air. There are two type of passage:-

Fixed Passage:- Same gases circulate i.e pure O2 ,pure N2 M.P. Reversing Passage:- Air 5 bar and impure N2 0.3 bar alternatively .

Distillation Of Air :Lower Column:After cooling down air upto -176 C is enter into the lower column of 50 bubble cup tray column in which oxygen and nitrogen gases are separated . Air separation is done due to the gravity . As air is enter into the column it is began to divide. The nitrogen gas which is lighter in weight at low temperature moves upward of the column where it is mixed with leaned liquid and heat exhange is done by this upward moving gas with the lower part of the upper column. The reflux of lower column which is in the liquid
41

form called rich liquid contains 40% oxygen and lean liquid which contains 3% oxygen. For purifying rich liquid is end to the scrubber. The scrubbing is done by silica jeltrap to remove mainly hydro carbons from the rich liquid . The silica jel is regenrated after a definite period of time. The rich liquid is end to the upper column as its raw material . The lean is passed through exchangers and send to lower portion of upper part. The ntrogen is collected at the top sned to the super cooler for successive heat and then to the compressors to obtain the desired pressure.

Upper Column:Rich liquid after passing through expansion valves introduced into the upper column which is called Low-Pressure Column and it is a sixty trays.In this column nitrogen also move upward at a temperature of -191C and nitrogen condensates are also converted into the gas due to the heat exchange from the bottom and waste nitrogen at is collected at the top and send to the sub coolers . The Oxygen iat -176C is collected as in gas form is collected and send to the super coole fro heat exchange and then to the compressors to obtain the desired pressure.

Production Capacities:Run No. 1 Gaseous Production Only:

o 7600 NM3/HR of Gaseous Oxygen 9.5% purity at 0.1500 Bar Pressure o 4500 NM3/Hr of gaseous Nitrogen, 15-PPM maximum impurities at 0.8 Bar Pressure.

Run No.2 Liquid & Gaseous Production:

o 530 Nm3/Hr of Gaseous Oxygen, 99.5% purity at 0.150 Bar Pressure o 700 Nm3/Hr of equivalent liquid oxygen, 99.5 % purity o 4500 NM3/Hr of gaseous nitrogen, 15-PPM maximum impurities at 0.8 Bar Pressure.

42

Description Of Equipment & Process:Each air separation unit comprises of : Air Compressor Unit Reversing Exchanger Distillation column Frigorific Production units Compressed air & for recovering the products coming out from the cold boxes by passing the compressed air through a series of heat exchangers. The frigorific & liquid productions are dine with two expansion turbines. In one turbine, pure nitrogen is expanded from 5.3 Bar Guage while in the other turbine , gaseous air is expanded from 0.5 Bar guage to 0.4 bar guage. The frigorific power of the latter is used liquefying gaseous oxygen at 34 bars in the exchangers. This liquid Oxygen passing through the main column is pumped to the liquid oxygen storage. The pure nitrogen expanded in the nitrogen expansion turbines or in the nitrogen by-pass valve is the production of pure nitrogen (45000 Nm3?hr each unit) at the outlet of cold box. The gaseous oxygen produced by the cold boxes is sent to 03 oxygen compressor for compressing o0xygen gas from 0.150 bars to 34 bars. The gaseous oxygen at 34 bars gauge is stored in 1200m3 storage capacity. The gaseous oxygen is supplied at constant pressure to various units of Pakistan steel through 4 double expansion devices. In case of breakdown or failure of the plant or any of oxygen compressors, liquid oxygen from liquid oxygen storage is pumped & vapourized at 34 Bars guage at a rate of 4750N NM3/Hr & sent to Oxygen reservoir. Capacity of the liquid oxygen tank is 1750 M3.Pure Nitrogen at the outlet of Cold boxes mau b used directly at the pressure of 0.8 bars guage for dry quenching & shielding or may be compressed at Bat guage in 02 nitrogen compressor each having a capacity of 250 NM3/Hr. Pure Nitfogen Gas at 20 Bars pressure is stored in a 480 M3 Capacity Storage Comopressing of three vessels each of 160 M3. Thos Nitrogen Gas
43

is supplied at a constant pressure to the various units Of Pakistan Steel in one double expansion device. The Plant has one Air drying unit for complete Derming of the Cold Boxes & regeneration of rich liquid & Oxygen liquid Filters. Two small storages having capacity of 10M3 each of liquid Oxygen & liquid Nitrogen Along with the two pumps & atmospheric vapourizers have been installed for filling oxygen & nitrogen in cylinders uptp 165 Bars Guage.

Consumers Of Oxygen Gas:

Oxygen Gas Production= 15200 NM3/Hr Oxygen Gas Not Utilized By The Consumers=20-25%

Utilization Of Different waters:Water Air Comp(02) 100 cu.m/hr 50 cu.m/h 90 cu.m/hr Oxygen comp(03) 282 cu.m/hr 165 cu.m/hr Net Comp(03) Turbines(04)

Sea Water Industrial Water Cooler water

6 Cu.m/hr

12 Cu.m/hr

44

Consumption OF The Remaining Oxygen Gas By The Consumers:S. No

Department
Steel Making Department

Consumption
86%

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Iron Making Steel Making Department Central Maintenance Department

0.25%

0.50%

Refectories & Lime Prod.

3.50%

Billet Mill

4.00%

Hot Strip Mill

5.00%

Cold Rolling Mill

0.75%

45

46

47