Article

pubs.acs.org/IECR

Process Synthesis of Mixed Refrigerant System for Ethylene Plants

Cuixia Xu, Jian Zhang, Ha Dinh, and Qiang Xu*
Dan F. Smith Department of Chemical Engineering, Lamar University, Beaumont, Texas 77710, United States

ABSTRACT: The refrigeration system is one of the most important and

critical utility systems in the chemical and petrochemical industries. The
traditional cascade refrigeration system (CRS) has been used for decades
in ethylene plants. However, the mixed refrigerant system (MRS) with
higher energy efficiency and less capital expenses than CRS has not
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widely been applied in ethylene plants. In this paper, a general

methodology has been proposed for the synthesis of a tertiary refrigerant
of MRS containing a mixture of methane, ethylene and propylene that
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can satisfy all the cooling/heating refrigeration that the traditional

ethylene−propylene CRS serves in an ethylene plant. The exergy-
temperature chart combined with the exergy analysis is presented to
analyze comprehensively the thermodynamic nature of both CRS and MRS. Furthermore, the comparison of economic
performances of these two different systems is also conducted. The efficacy of the developed MRS methodology has been
demonstrated by a case study, where the capital and utility costs are respectively saved by 21.0% and 12.1%; and the compressor
shaft work is also reduced by 11.2% compared with the CRS.

1. INTRODUCTION However, the design of a multiloop refrigerant system,

Ethylene is one of the most important petrochemical
intermediates with the largest bulk productivity in the
petrochemical industry. Ethylene is also widely produced in
more than 50 countries by 117 companies. The ethylene
production capacity reached about 130 million tons worldwide in
2013.1 Chemicals made with ethylene such as high/low
polyethylene, linear low density polyethylene, ethylene oxide,
linear alcohols, vinyl acetate and ethylbenzene are fundamental
raw materials for productions of food packaging, toys, food
containers, pipelines, bottles and so on, which are extremely
important to people’s daily life. The increasing growth of the
ethylene production is highly expected due to the rapid growth of
the world economy and population. The ethylene productivity is
estimated to increase 17% per year from 2015 to 2019.2
In the most popular ethylene production of thermal cracking,
ethylene is recovered from the charge gas from cracking furnace,
which contains various concentrations of hydrogen, methane,
ethane, ethylene, propane, propylene, and higher hydrocarbons,
nitrogen and other trace components. The refrigeration for
condensing and fractionating such charge gas mixtures is
commonly employed in industries at successively lower temper-
ature levels, which are far below the ambient temperature. This
recovery process is technically, economically important and
highly energy intensive.3 Thus, the refrigeration system holds an
important role in ethylene plants. Thermodynamically, a
refrigeration system is a heat-pump process, where heat is
removed from low-temperature sources and transferred it to
higher-temperature sinks at the expense of mechanical work,
thermal energy, pressure difference or other means.4,5 As one of
the most complicated and energy-intensive processes, the design
of an energy-efficient and low-cost refrigeration system provides
a great improvement on plant operability and profitability.
especially for ethylene plants, is a challenging task due to the
following strict requirements:6,7 (i) The industrial refrigeration
system has to satisfy the cooling requirements from many
different units with different temperatures, which means the
refrigerant system needs to work at multiple temperature/
pressure levels at the same time. (ii) These designed temper-
ature/pressure levels should be well integrated with processes
and other utility systems to minimize the energy consumption.
(iii) A complex refrigeration system in the chemical plant needs
to accomplish different refrigerant tasks in a wide temperature
range. Thermodynamically, it is impossible to achieve that by
using only one pure refrigerant as the working medium. With the
conventional refrigeration method, this broad temperature range
is achieved by a CRS, where multiple single-component
refrigeration subsystems are integrated in cascade. Each
refrigeration subsystem will have multiple loops working at
different temperature/pressure levels within a certain temper-
ature range to handle multiple refrigeration tasks. Thus, each
refrigeration subsystem will employ a multistage compressor, a
set of suction drums, and many other types of auxiliary
equipment. To reduce capital and operating costs of refrigerant
system, chemical plants can adopt a single refrigeration system by
using a mixture of multiple refrigerants as the working medium to
accomplish all the same refrigeration tasks from CRS, enabling a
MRS to have the same functions as CRS. The capital cost of the
refrigerant system in a chemical plant plays a significant part of
the overall plant cost. Thus, the capital savings from the
Received: January 9, 2017
Revised: April 7, 2017
Accepted: June 22, 2017
Published: June 22, 2017

© 2017 American Chemical Society 7984 DOI: 10.1021/acs.iecr.7b00111

Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. 2017, 56, 7984−7999
Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research
refrigerant system will greatly affect the overall plant cost.8,9
From an operating point of view, the mixed refrigerant system
provides refrigeration at a continuum of temperatures, with
smaller temperature differences at the lower temperatures. It
leads to a smaller increase in entropy or a smaller loss of
energy,10,11 i.e., the consumption of the shaft work in compressor
will be less.
Process synthesis of refrigeration systems has been studied for
decades, Barnés and King12 proposed both heuristics and
dynamic programming methods to set intermediate temperature
stages and identify process configurations for cascade refriger-
ation and gas liquefaction systems. Cheng and Mah13 developed
an interactive computational strategy for the evolutionary
synthesis of minimal cost refrigeration system cascading with
multiple heat sources. Townsend and Linnhoff14 used heuristics
method to determine the appropriate placement of heat pumps
and heat engines in the process network based on thermody-
namic insights. Shelton and Grossman15 developed a mixed-
integer linear programming (MILP) model to optimize the
refrigeration cycle based on the representation of refrigeration
system superstructure. Vaidyaraman and Marana16 introduced a
mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) synthesis
model with simplification to simultaneously select refrigerants
and synthesize cascade refrigeration configuration. Wu and
Zhu17 proposed a systematic method to optimize the complex
refrigeration cycles and the special heat exchanger network
(HEN) simultaneously. Lee et al.11 combined nonlinear
programming (NLP) techniques and thermodynamics to design
mixed refrigerant (MR) cycles for low temperature processes.
Zhang et al.6 developed a new multilevel MINLP synthesis
model considering the existence of subcoolers to design the
cascade refrigeration system. Mafi et al.18 explored heuristics
method and thermodynamics approach for optimal selection of
refrigerant composition and operation pressure levels of mixed
refrigerant cascade cycle with a given configuration. Dinh et al.19
proposed a general methodology and mathematical MILP model
to optimize the CRS process and HEN simultaneously based on
exergy analysis.
The mixed refrigerant system has also been studied for a long
time. Podbielniak20 devised a low-temperature mixed refriger-
ation system in a three-stage single compressor in 1936. After
that, MRS is widely used for LNG, separation of air, the
liquefaction of nitrogen and etc. And it was adopted for the
commercial liquefaction of natural gas more than 40 years ago.
Over 95% of the base-load LNG plants operated on mixed
refrigerant processes, with the remaining few operating on
conventional cascade processes.21 However, because of the
complexities of ethylene plants and refrigerant systems
aforementioned or possible intellectual copyright concerns, in-
depth systematic studies for a complex mixed refrigeration
system design and operation are still lack of publications.
The exergy analysis is a thermodynamic tool that can be used
to evaluate comprehensively the performance of refrigeration
systems. The exergy of a system can be defined as the maximum
potential work that can be delivered by the system when it is
brought into equilibrium with its surrounding environment. The
exergy analysis has been applied with great success by many
authors in different processes.19,22,23 With exergy analysis, it is
possible to evaluate exergy changes due to temperature, pressure
and phase changes that usually occur in refrigerant system and
present the most opportunities for exergy loss reduction.
Disregarding kinetic and potential energy changes, the specific
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flow exergy and exergy change of a fluid at any cycle state are
given by24,25
B = H − TaS (1)
ΔB = ΔH − TaΔS (2)
where B is the specific flow exergy and quantitatively defined as
the difference between enthalpy (H) and the product of entropy
(S) and the ambient temperature (Ta) (eq 1). ΔB, ΔH and ΔS in
eq 2 are the specific flow exergy change, enthalpy and entropy
changes, respectively.
In this paper, a general methodology has been developed for
the synthesis of a tertiary refrigerant MRS containing a mixture of
methane, ethylene and propylene, which can satisfy the cooling/
heating requirements that the traditional ethylene−propylene
CRS services in an ethylene plant. The operation of conventional
CRS of an olefin plant is described first. Next, the exergy analysis
is conducted for CRS to investigate the steady-state behaviors of
the refrigerant system, locating and evaluating exergy loss in the
system. After that, the MRS superstructure with a view of
decreasing the power consumption for providing the same
refrigeration duties is developed. The efficacy of the developed
methodology has been demonstrated by a case study, where the
capital and utility costs have been significantly reduced.
2. PROBLEM STATEMENT
Based on given information on the CRS in an existing ethylene
plant, the objective of this study is to design a more energy-
efficient and low-cost refrigeration system providing the same
refrigeration duties as the existing one. Exergy analysis will be
conducted to evaluate the energy efficiency of the existing
refrigeration system, and a superstructure will be developed
based on the concept of MRS. The final solution with smaller
compressor work consumption and less capital cost will be
identified. For clarification, the given information and
information to be determined for this study are specified as the
following.
Given Information:
(1) Existing CRS with the detail structure and its process flow
diagram (PFD), piping and instrumentation diagram
(P&ID); and
(2) Inlet/outlet temperature and heating/cooling duty
specifications for a set of process streams that need to be
served by MRS.
Information to be determined:
(1) A detailed structure of the entire MRS;
(2) The refrigerant flow rate and composition of each unit in
the MRS;
(3) Specific temperature/pressure levels employed in MRS;
(4) Compressor shaft work; and
(5) Capital cost and utility cost.
3. GENERAL METHODOLOGY
3.1. Methodology Framework. Given an existing CRS in
an ethylene plant with a set of heating/cooling demands for
process streams coupling with their initial and targeted
temperatures, the objective of this study is to develop an MRS
that provides the same refrigeration as that of the CRS to
minimize the total compressor work consumption and the capital
cost based on exergy analysis. The detail structure of MRS, the
composition of MR, temperature/pressure levels, as well as
refrigerant flow rate of each temperature/pressure level need to
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Figure 1. General methodology framework.
be determined. To accomplish the above, a general methodology
for MRS synthesis is developed as shown in Figure 1. The
developed methodology for an MRS that can satisfy all the same
cooling/heating duty requirements as an existing CRS involves
two stages of work: (i) Exergy-based thermodynamic analysis of
the existing CRS, which identifies the process improvement
opportunities in terms of saving exergy/energy losses; and (ii)
MRS synthesis and solution identification.
In details, a rigorous steady-state simulation model of the
investigated CRS will be first developed based on the plant PFD,
P&ID and CRS input data to acquire information for carrying out
exergy-based thermodynamic analysis. The commercial simu-
lator such as ASPEN Plus V8.8 (AspenTech Inc., 2015) has been
used for such a model establishment. The thermodynamic
package used in this study is PR-BM (Peng−Robinson cubic
equation of state with the Boston−Mathias alpha function)26 due
to the fact that the most of components in ethylene plant system
are nonpolar or mildly polar hydrocarbon mixtures and the
process is conducted under high pressure conditions. Next,
process stream data will be extracted from the simulation model,
and the specific flow exergy of each stream will be calculated
based on eqs 1 and 2 to generate a specific flow exergy path
plotted in the exergy-temperature (B-T) chart. Based on the
generated B-T chart, in-depth thermodynamic analysis will be
performed to identify and evaluate exergy loss of the existing
CRS. Naturally, energy saving opportunities will be explored and
identified. During this stage, heuristic inputs from industrial
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expertise are always welcomed; they may not ensure all valid
solution alternatives, but can ultimately help eliminate invalid
solution alternatives prior to quantitative studies in the next
stage.
Based on the conclusive outcomes from the thermodynamic
analysis in the first stage, as well as service requirements of MRS
and industrial expertise, a synthesis superstructure of the MRS
configuration will be developed in the second stage. In this
superstructure, MR will be separated into high-pressure light
mixed refrigerant (LMR) and high-pressure heavy mixed
refrigerant (HMR) in a flash drum. After chilled and released
pressure, the LMR can be used to provide cooling duties to the
process streams with the lowest temperature range levels;
meanwhile, the HMR can be used to serve the process streams
with high temperature range levels. The detail structure of the
superstructure will be explained in the latter section.
The procedure to develop an MRS with the detail structure,
the composition of MR, temperature/pressure levels, as well as
refrigerant flow rate of each unit, starts from an initial setting of
the refrigerant composition, flow rates and pressure levels based
on the representation of the superstructure. The initial
composition of refrigerant can be initially set from the literature7
and will be modified during iterations. Also, the initial of flow
rates and pressure level can be values in reasonable ranges. Under
a given composition of refrigerant and the superstructure, the
flow rates, pressure levels and the arrangement of all the units are
adjusted to achieve a process flowsheet that satisfies all the
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Figure 2. Sketch (a) and B-T chart (b) of a single-loop refrigeration system. Reprinted with permission from ref 6. Copyright 2017 Elsevier.
cooling/heating requirements that CRS serves. After that, the
temperature cross of all heat exchangers should be checked. If
temperature cross occurs in any of the condensers, subcoolers or
evaporators, the flow rates and pressure levels should be adjusted
again. If the problem still cannot be solved, the composition
modifying should be considered. If the temperature cross is
eliminated in this step, the next step is to compare the
compressor work and capital cost of the new flowsheet with
those of CRS. If either of those requirements is not satisfied, the
troubleshooting should be performed in the previous steps to
start another iteration. Similarly, flow rates, pressure levels and
the arrangement of all the units with the new composition will be
tuned again. Iteratively, the methodology will eventually lead to a
desired MRS solution. A new configuration and the composition
of MR will be achieved, and refrigerant flow rate in each unit,
pressure levels, as well as the arrangement of the subcoolers and
evaporators are determined. The new configuration needs to
satisfy all cooling/heating demands of all the process streams
under thermodynamic constraints such as no temperature cross.
The tuning of flow rates, pressure levels and arrangements of all
the units is based on engineering heuristics and judgment.
3.2. Exergy Analysis. 3.2.1. B-T Chart Based on a Single-
Loop Refrigeration System. The B-T chart has been proven as a
valuable tool for thermodynamic analysis of refrigeration systems
indicating both physical property and energy behavior of the
system at every operating step. For clarification, the B-T chart
developed by Zhang and Xu6 is employed to lay out the base of
our development. As shown, Figure 2a illustrates the process
sketch of a single-loop refrigeration cycle containing four basic
equipment components: evaporator, compressor, condenser,
and expansion valve, and including a flow component: refrigerant
that is circulated in the cycle and equipment. Figure 2b
thermodynamically translates the refrigeration system into a B-
T chart, which is an illustrative sketch of the single-loop
refrigerant cycle by using propylene as the refrigerant. The
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detailed refrigerant information, ambient temperature (Ta) and
operating conditions (e.g., temperature, pressure, enthalpy and
entropy) under different working situations are obtained in
advance through a rigorous steady-state simulation for
generating the B-T chart. A B-T chart contains saturated vapor
and liquid lines, and closed-loop operating lines of the
refrigerant. The saturated vapor and liquid lines separate the B-
T chart into five regions. The region (I) in Figure 2b suggests
superheated vapor phase, and the region (II) represents
subcooled liquid. The intersecting point of these two lines
corresponds to the equilibrium state at the ambient temperature.
The region (III) below the intersecting point represents a
vapor−liquid coexistence phase. The region (IV) above the
intersecting point presents a unique but interesting region. It is
still a single phase region, which means an operation point within
this region can be either superheated vapor or subcooled liquid
phase. The exact state of an operating point in this region
depends on its initial status. Region (V) represents the
supercritical phase, enclosed by isobaric and isothermal lines at
the critical pressure and temperature.
The operating states of 1 through 4 in Figure 2b correspond to
the same states in Figure 2a. Generally, the refrigerant dumps
heat to a high-temperature heat sink (1 → 2) through a
condenser, where the temperature of the refrigerant decreases
and the refrigerant is liquefied. Therefore, the condensing line (1
→ 2) in Figure 2b sequentially undergoes temperature reduction
(from state 1 to the saturated vapor line) and condensation
(from the saturated vapor line to the saturated liquid line). When
the refrigerant passes through the expansion valve (2 → 3), both
pressure and temperature are significantly reduced. Although
enthalpy of the refrigerant is unchanged during this process, its
entropy increases. It results in a slightly decrease in exergy. After
that, the refrigerant absorbs the heat from the low-temperature
heat source and is vaporized at a low temperature (3 → 4).
Because the temperature/pressure is unchanged during the
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Figure 3. Sketch (a) and B-T chart (b) of a simple CRS.
Figure 4. Sketch (a) and B-T chart (b) of a simple MRS.
evaporation process, the evaporation line is horizontal in Figure
2b. The exergy is reduced because of heat absorbed from a heat
source. After that, the vapor refrigerant stream is compressed to
the high temperature/pressure level again by the compressor (4
→ 1), and the compression line is on the left of the saturated
vapor line in Figure 2b. Through such a closed-loop working
procedure, heat is continuously transferred from the low-
temperature source to the high-temperature sink at the expense
of the compression work. It should also be noted that the
horizontal distance between two operating states represents the
exergy change of the refrigerant. It can be seen in Figure 2b
obviously the exergy of refrigerant is increased by the compressor
(4 → 1) due to the increase of enthalpy and reduced by the
condenser, expansion valve and evaporator.
3.2.2. B-T Chart of a Simple CRS. Figure 3a gives an example
of a simple CRS, where the high temperature cycle and the low
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temperature cycle are integrated in cascades by sharing an
interexchanger. Refrigerant A of the high temperature loop and
refrigerant B of the low temperature cycle are circulated in
different cycles, each cycle has their own compressor, expansion
valve, refrigerant, condenser and evaporator. Note that the two
separated cycles can exchange heat through the interexchanger,
which acts as the evaporator of the high temperature cycle, and
works as the condenser of the low temperature cycle. Through
such a CRS, the heat can be continuously transferred from the
source of the low temperature cycle to the interexchanger, then
to the heat sink of the high temperature cycle. Correspondingly,
the refrigeration system in Figure 3a can be mapped to Figure 3b
to study how to improve the exergy efficiency of the refrigeration
system. The thermodynamic properties including the temper-
ature, temperature change and the specific exergy change can be
easily analyzed in Figure 3b. The upper loop in Figure 3b is the
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Figure 5. Superstructure for MRS with multiple temperature/pressure levels.
high-T cycle; it has the same types of operating lines as the single-
loop refrigeration system in Figure 2b, including condensing line
(1 → 2), expansion line (2 → 3), evaporation line (3 → 4) and
compression line (4 → 1). In the lower loop in Figure 3b is the
low-T cycle; it includes condensing line (5 → 6), expansion line
(6 → 7), evaporation line (7 → 8) and compression line (8 → 5).
Note that for refrigerant B, the temperature of the equilibrium
point of the saturated vapor and liquid lines is lower that the
ambient temperature. Thus, no single phase region is existed
above the intersecting point. Also note that to cover many
refrigeration tasks at different temperature/pressure levels
through a wide temperature range, flash drums and staged
compressors can be applied in each refrigerant cycle in the CRS
to obtain multiple loops working at different temperature/
pressure levels. In practice, the propylene−ethylene−methane
refrigerant system employed in many ethylene plants is a typical
example of a complex CRS.
3.2.3. B-T Chart of a Simple MRS. Based on the previous
development, a simple MRS with two evaporators and one
multistage compressor in a close-loop cycle is depicted in Figure
4a. Correspondingly, Figure 4b thermodynamically translates the
refrigeration system presented by Figure 4a into a B-T chart. An
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MR usually is a mixture of methane, ethane or ethylene, and
propylene or propane. In the simple cycle of Figure 4a, the MR
dumps heat to a high-temperature heat sink (1 → 2) through a
condenser; and then it is separated into the vapor stream (LMR)
containing lighter components with lower boiling point (2 → 3)
as well as the liquid stream (HMR) containing heavier
components with higher boiling point (2 → 7) in the flash
drum. The flow rate ratio of the vapor and liquid streams and
compositions of both the vapor and liquid streams can be
adjusted by the outlet temperature of the condenser and the
composition of the MR stream. The HMR stream passes through
an expansion valve (7 → 8) (or possibly pass a subcooler first
then enter the expansion valve) and absorbs heat from the high
temperature heat source (8 → 9). The LMR stream enters an
expansion value (3 → 4) (or enters expansion valve after
liquefaction) and reaches a relative lower temperature. Next, the
LMR is used to chill the low temperature heat source (4 → 5).
After compressed (5 → 6) to the same pressure as that of HMR,
the LMR stream (6) is merged with the HMR stream (9), the
temperature of the mixing point (10) should be somewhere
between states 6 and 9, shown in Figure 4b. After mixing, the MR
is compressed to the higher pressure (10 → 1); and thus the full
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working cycle is completed. As shown in Figure 4b, the LMR
stream is served at the lower temperature level, as it is evaporated
at the lower temperature than that of the HMR stream, so as the
pressure. Combining temperature levels that LMR and HMR
streams can operate, the MRS can accomplish refrigeration tasks
at a very wide temperature range in one single circulation loop.
To operate in more temperature/pressure levels and cover more
refrigeration tasks, more flash drums and multistage compressors
are used based on the structure of this simple MRS.
3.3. Superstructure Development. The developed super-
structure for MRS synthesis in this study is shown in Figure 5,
which contains all possible arrangements for the subcoolers,
evaporators and the staged compressor with different temper-
ature/pressure levels. For the compressor, only one compressor
with multiple stages is used in the entire cycle, where the number
of the stage (n) is determined by the thermal demand of the
process streams. The process streams needing cooling services
can be briefly classified into several range levels according to their
temperature ranges. For an example of a typical ethylene plant,
the process streams with the temperature range from 43 to 25 °C
can be considered as the highest temperature range level, then
the temperature range from −90 to −100 °C, which has the
coldest temperature levels among all the process streams, can be
considered as the lowest temperature range level. If the process
streams can be roughly divided into five temperature range levels,
the compressor is assumed to have five stages, and number of
stages can be modified in the detailing design. In the compressor
design, each stage should have one flash drum for mixing streams,
buffering inlet pressures and preventing the liquid entering the
compressor, and intermediate cooling should be added to
prevent undesirable polymerization in the compressor if the
outlet temperature of the compressor in the previous stage is
high.
In the superstructure, the MR used in the studied ethylene
plant consists of CH4 (5−20 wt %), C2H4 (10−40 wt %) and
C3H6 (60−90 wt %). The MR stream from the outlet of the
highest stage of the compressor is partially condensed by the
cooling water and separated into the light mixed refrigerant
stream (LMR, the vapor output of the flash drum) and the heavy
mixed refrigerant stream (HMR, the liquid output of the flash
drum). The flow rates, the split ratio of the flow rates and the
compositions of the LMR and HMR streams can be adjusted by
the outlet temperature of the cooling water condenser and the
composition of the MR stream. The LMR stream can be liquefied
and further chilled down to a very low temperature, and then
passed through the Joule−Thomson expansion valve to reach the
lowest pressure level in the system. Thus, the LMR can absorb
the heat from process streams with the lowest temperature range
level. The final pressure of the LMR stream are affected by many
factors, such as the composition of the MR stream and the
temperatures and cooling demands of process streams that it will
serve. For process streams in the same temperature range, if the
inlet and outlet temperatures of several process streams are close,
the refrigerant stream can be split into several streams with
possible different flow rates to cool down these process streams
in parallel and merged into one stream after the evaporation
processes. Also, the sequential evaporation can be considered if
the temperature of a refrigerant stream after some heat exchange
is still lower than that of another process stream to be cooled.
Furthermore, refrigerant streams from the HMR side having the
same pressure as those from the LMR side can be mixed to
supply further cooling duties to process streams.
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In the superstructure, the LMR streams in the lowest
temperature/pressure level should be sent back to the first-
stage compressor after its service. The HMR stream from the
flash drum might be subcooled then separated, or separated
directly into several streams without subcooling according to the
cooling demands. Each stream can be cooled down to different
temperatures and pressures by subcoolers and expansion valves.
The parallel evaporation and the sequential evaporation can also
be used in HMR streams. After the evaporation, refrigerant
streams can either go to a flash drum of the corresponding
compressor according to their pressures, or merge streams
having the similar temperature/pressure. Note that shortcut
streams from the vapor outlet of flash drums can be sequentially
cooled, and then used to merge streams, which need a larger flow
rate with more cooling duty.
3.4. Capital Cost Estimation. In this paper, the Guthrie’s
method27,28 is adopted for the preliminary capital cost
estimation. The base cost of the equipment increases nonlinearly
with equipment size or capacity, which can be expressed as
⎛ q ⎞α
C = Co⎜⎜ ⎟⎟
⎝ qo ⎠ (3)
where Co and qo are base cost and capacity of a piece of
equipment, respectively, whereas C is the cost of the equipment
with capacity q. The size exponent α is often about 0.6 to 0.7.
For cylindrical pressure vessels, a more general form from
Guthrie is used.
⎛ L ⎞ β ⎛ D ⎞γ
C = Co⎜ ⎟ ⎜ ⎟
⎝ Lo ⎠ ⎝ Do ⎠ (4)
where L, Lo, D and Do are the lengths and diameters of the
investigated and referenced cylindrical pressure vessel, respec-
tively; β and γ are size exponents.
Guthrie27 proposed a simple factoring method for add-on
costs, which has a probable error up to 20%. The bare module
cost (BMC) is the sum of the direct and indirect costs associated
with equipment purchase and installation. The bare module
factor (MF) is defined to calculate BMC, which is expressed in eq
5. Also, the installation cost (IC) can be obtained in eq 6, which is
usually calculated on the carbon steel basis.
BMC = C × MF (5)
IC = BMC − C = C(MF − 1) (6)
In the Guthrie’s method, the cost data for the basic
configuration of the pressure vessel, heat exchanger, compressor
and etc., are calculated based on the carbon steel with certain
pressures. Thus, the materials and pressure correction factors
(MPF) is defined for various types of equipment with special
materials and working under high pressures. Thus, the
uninstalled cost (UC) of an equipment is formulated as below:
(7)
UC = C × MPF
Based on eqs 6 and 7, the total installed cost (TIC) including
UC and IC is represented by eq 8.
TIC = UC + IC = C(MPF + MF − 1) (8)
The base cost data used in the above eqs 3 and 4 are from the
average mid-1968 cost data for a United States Gulf Coast
location. The update factor (UF) shown in eq 9 is employed to
update these costs.
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Figure 6. Sketch of the process flow diagram for the studied ethylene plant.

Table 1. Given Information of Process Streams Served by the Existing CRS

Stream ID Related Unit ID Related Unit Type Inlet T (°C) Outlet T (°C) Q (GJ/h) Related Unit Descriptions
1 CO-1 Cooler −36.0 −35.8 0.03 Evaporator of liquid ethylene from storage
2 CO-2 Cooler −6.1 −5.9 7.01 Demethanizer (De-C1) reboiler
3 CO-3 Cooler 16.0 16.2 1.92 Demethanizer stripper reboiler
4 CO-4 Cooler −29.3 31.8 2.20 Cold box #1
5 CO-5 Cooler −26.9 30.0 1.10 Ethane product from C2 splitter heater
6 CO-6 Cooler −54.8 −26.9 1.67 Ethane recycle vaporizer
7 CO-7 Cooler −76 −41.7 1.55 Coldbox # 2
8 CO-8 Cooler −70.7 −70 2.17 C2 Splitter reflux subcooler
9 CO-9 Cooler −110 −53.8 21.61 Coldbox # 3
10 E-1 Evaporator 37.4 28.0 −0.36 Methanator effluent subcooler #2
11 E-2 Evaporator 43.3 33.0 −3.81 Dryer feed chiller #1
12 E-3 Evaporator 37.4 27.0 −1.92 High-pressure depropanizer reflux chiller #1
13 E-4 Evaporator 33.2 12.8 −11.72 Dryer feed chiller No. 2
14 E-5 Evaporator 12.1 11.0 −0.04 Low-pressure depropanizer (LP DeC3) condenser
15 E-6 Evaporator 1.4 −9.8 −8.34 High-pressure depropanizer reflux chiller #3
16 E-7 Evaporator 16.0 −8.3 −11.70 High-pressure depropanizer (HP DeC3) feed chiller
17 E-8 Evaporator −9.8 −33.5 −15.18 High-pressure depropanizer reflux chiller #5
18 E-9 Evaporator −35.8 −36.0 −18.54 Deethanizer (DeC2) condenser
19 E-10 Evaporator −63.5 −70 −1.26 Demethanizer feed chiller No. 3
20 E-11 Evaporator −93.9 −97.4 −5.02 Demethanizer condenser
21 E-12 Evaporator −79.5 −97 −2.51 Demethanizer feed chiller No. 4

I mixture from the furnaces, namely cracked gas, is then sent to the
UF =
Io
where I and Io are the Chemical Engineering Plant Index of the
current year and mid-1968, respectively. Finally, the updated
bare module cost (UBMC) is shown in eq 10:
UBMC = TIC × UF = C(MPF + MF − 1)UF
4. CASE STUDY
4.1. Process Description and Exergy Analysis of a
Typical CRS. The retrofit design of a CRS in an ethylene plant is
employed as the case study in this paper. This plant is a front-end
depropanizer ethylene plant producing the main products of
ethylene and propylene. Figure 6 shows a simplified process
diagram of this plant. At the beginning of the process, the
feedstock is sent to the furnaces for cracking. The effluent gas
(9) oil and water quench towers sequentially. Next, the charge gas
from the water quench overhead is compressed in a four-stage
charge gas compressor (CGC) for compression. Between the
third and fourth stages of the compression, the charge gas will be
treated via caustic tower and drier before entering the
(10) depropanizer system (DeC3). The primary purpose of DeC3 is
to separate C3s and lighter components to the light-end and C4s
and heavier ones to the heavy-end. After that, C3s and lighter
components from DeC3 is further compressed through the CGC
fourth stage, reacts in the acetylene reactor to convert acetylene
to ethylene, and then is chilled against the refrigerants in the
chilling train, where hydrogen is separated out. The remainder of
this stream is further processed in demethanizer (DeC1), and
deethanizer (DeC2), as well as ethylene and propylene splitters
to separate ethylene and propylene products, respectively.
Meanwhile, the stream with C4s and heavier components from
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Figure 7. Base case design of the existing CRS in the ethylene plant.
DeC3 will be sequentially directed to debutanizer (DeC4) and
depentanizer (DeC5) to obtain C4s, C5s and gasoline oils,
respectively.
The studied CRS in the original ethylene plant includes a
propylene refrigerant subsystem and an ethylene refrigerant
subsystem. It supplies cooling duties for 12 process users with
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temperature changes ranging from +43.3 to −97.4 °C as well as
provides heating duties to 9 process users. Detailed information
about the cooling/heating demands, inlet/outlet temperature,
and locations of process streams that are involved in the plant
existing CRS is listed in Table 1. In this study, the base case is the
existing CRS design of the plant. Figure 7 gives the original
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Figure 8. B-T plot of the studied existing CRS.
flowsheet of the studied ethylene−propylene CRS. Note that the
information in Table 1 are fixed as inputs for the optimal
synthesis and design of the MRS proposed by this study.
As shown in Figure 7, the propylene vapor stream in the
propylene refrigerant subsystem (the upper cycle in Figure 7) is
compressed to 18.46 bar in the last stage of the compressor. After
four-stage compression, a small part of propylene vapor stream is
split and cooled down by a subcooler (CO-1) and then sent to
the level 1 flash drum (HF-1). The majority of propylene vapor
stream will dump the heat to the cooling water through the
condenser (CW) and will be completely liquefied. This liquefied
propylene stream will be then separated into 6 streams: The first
stream is chilled down through a subcooler (CO-5) and reduces
its pressure to 3.59 bar and then goes to the level 4 directly. The
second split stream is cooled down by a subcooler (CO-2) and
releases its pressure through an expansion valve. The other three
split streams will go through their expansion valves and then cool
down process streams in their respective evaporators (E-1, E-2
and E-3). After that, these three streams are merged into one to
enter HF-1. The last split stream with the largest flow rate will go
through an expansion valve to reduce its temperature first; and
then merge with the stream from CO-1 before directed to HF-1.
The temperature and pressure of these streams entering HF-1 are
approximately 22.1 °C and 10.81 bar, respectively. After flashed
in HF-1, the vapor outlet is recycled back to the fourth stage
compressor suction (HC-1), whereas the liquid stream is sent to
the level 2 and split into four streams: three split streams go
through expansion valves and evaporators (E-4, I-1 and E-5) to
provide cooling duties to process streams and ethylene
refrigerant; and the fourth split stream with the largest flow
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rate passes an expansion valve to lower its pressure and
temperature. Next, these four streams merge together and flow
to the level 2 flash drum (HF-2). The temperature and pressure
of the influents of HF-2 are about 7.1 °C and 7.24 bar,
respectively. The propylene refrigerant is separated into liquid
and vapor streams again by HF-2. A part of the vapor stream is
recycled back to the inlet of the third stage compressor (HC-2),
and then the remaining vapor stream is condensed by a process
stream through a condenser (CO-3) and then sent to the level 3
flash drum (HF-3). The liquid outflow from HF-2 has similar
operations as the liquid outflow from HF-1. Note that the
temperature and pressure of the propylene refrigerant streams
before entering HF-3 are −14.4 °C and 3.75 bar, respectively.
After flashing in HF-3, the vapor and liquid streams experience
the similar treatments as those in the previous level, except the
liquid stream mixes with the short-cut stream from CO-5 before
the splitting operation. The temperature and pressure of the level
4 flash drum (HF-4) are decreased to −40.1 °C and 1.43 bar,
respectively. Finally, the refrigerant vapor stream flows back to
the first stage propylene compressor.
In the ethylene refrigerant subsystem (the lower cycle in
Figure 7), the ethylene vapor stream is compressed to 17.52 bar
after the last stage of the compressor. This superheated vapor is
sequentially condensed by the propylene refrigerant (through
interexchangers I-1, I-2 and I-3) and a process stream (through
CO-6) to −34.5 °C. Then, this ethylene liquid stream is sent to
the ethylene accumulator (LV). A part of the ethylene liquid
stream from LV will go through a subcooler (CO-7) first and
then is split into two streams. (i) One spilt stream passes through
an expansion valve and mixes with the stream from a subcooler
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Figure 9. Process flowsheet of the developed MRS.
(CO-8). After that, the merged stream passes through a
subcooler (CO-9) to reach the level 2 flash drum (LF-2) of
the ethylene subsystem. (ii) The second split stream reduces its
pressure first by an expansion valve, and then flows to LF-2. The
remaining ethylene liquid stream from LV is directed to the level
1 flash drum (LF-1) of the ethylene subsystem, where it is
separated into the vapor and liquid streams. The temperature and
pressure of the ethylene refrigerant stream before entering LF-1
are −48.7 °C and 11.21 bar, respectively. The vapor stream
merges with a short-cut stream from the outlet of the second
stage compressor (LC-2). After that, the merged stream is
condensed by a process stream through CO-8 and then merged
with a stream from LV. The liquid outlet of LF-1 will be separated
into two streams: one passes through an expansion valve and an
evaporator (E-10) to provide the cooling duty to a process
stream; the other passes an expansion valve to reduce its
temperature and pressure first. After that, these two streams are
mixed together and directed to LF-2. At this stage, the
temperature and pressure of the streams before entering LF-2
are −76.0 °C and 4.05 bar, respectively. After flashing in LF-2,
the vapor stream is recycled back to the inlet of LC-2. The liquid
stream will be split into two streams. These two split streams
both reduce their temperatures to −100.8 °C via an expansion
valve, and then pass through their evaporators (E-11 and E-12)
to chill down process streams, respectively. Finally, the ethylene
vapor refrigerant will be sent back to the inlet of first stage
ethylene compressor (LC-3).
As shown in Figure 7, the original CRS has five temperature/
pressure levels in the propylene subsystem and four temper-
ature/pressure levels in the ethylene subsystem. The two
refrigeration subsystems are heat integrated by coupling
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evaporators I-1 at level 2, I-2 at level 3 and I-3 at level 4 from
the propylene subsystem with the condensing section of the
ethylene subsystem. Through this procedure, the cooling service
demands from 12 users and heating service demands from 9
users, both listed in Table 1, are all satisfied.
Based on the rigorous simulation of the existing CRS shown in
Figure 7, all the information for conducting exergy analysis has
been obtained. The corresponding B-T chart of the existing CRS
is developed as shown in Figure 8. Specific exergy pathways of the
propylene and ethylene flows are plotted in green and yellow
colors, respectively. For reference, saturated liquid and vapor
lines of both propylene and ethylene are plotted in blue. In
evaporators, the pure component refrigerant (propylene or
ethylene) vaporizes at a constant temperature at a fixed pressure.
Note that when the condensing temperatures of the process
streams are unchanged or relatively unchanged during the
cooling operation, a pure component refrigeration system
becomes more efficient.3 However, the temperature of process
stream is changed during the cooling/heating in the real
operation. By taking evaporator E-7 as an example, the red line
in Figure 8 representing the operating line of process stream in
evaporator E-7, which has a higher temperature than the
horizontal red line representing the operating line of the
propylene refrigerant in evaporator E-7, it is obvious that the
temperature of the process stream decreases along with the
cooling process; whereas that of the refrigerant is relatively
unchanged. Thus, the temperature driving force for heat transfer
changes too much: the temperature difference at the hot inlet
side is 27.9 °C. This setting is not exergy and energy efficient,
which may result in unnecessary compressor work consumption.
As the MR has an increasing temperature with increasing
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vaporization at a fixed pressure. Meanwhile, the composition of
the MR can be selected such that the liquid refrigerant evaporates
over the temperature range close to that of the process cooling
demand to provide the specified refrigeration demand with the
desired characteristic of the temperature driving force. Note that
the small temperature driving force leads to near-reversible
operation, thus better thermodynamic efficiency and lower
energy consumption, i.e., the compression work consumptions
under the same refrigeration duties can be reduced. Therefore,
the MRS is proposed to provide the same refrigeration as the
studied CRS for energy savings.
4.2. Process Description and Analysis of the New
Developed MRS. The cooling/heating demands of process
streams that are served in the existing CRS are listed in Table 1.
The new developed MRS needs to provide the same refrigeration
as that of CRS. Based on the methodology, the initial
composition of MR is chosen from the literature,7 and it consists
of 0.1 wt % H2, 11.7 wt % CH4, 17.6 wt % C2H4 and 70.6 wt %
C3H6. Based on the heuristics method described in the proposed
methodology and all the possible arrangements of the units
presented in the superstructure, the obtained MRS solution is
depicted in Figure 9. The MR is a mixture of 0.003 wt % H2, 5.3
wt % CH4, 13.8 wt % C2H4 and 80.9 wt % C3H6. This MRS has a
three-stage compressor with a flash drum at each stage to buffer
their inlet pressures and knockout potential liquids if any from
inlet streams. The first stage compressor (C-1) compresses the
MR from the pressure of 1.68 to 6.10 bar. The outflow of C-1
merges with the stream from an evaporator (E-6) before entering
the flash drum (F-2). After that, the outflow of F-2 enters the
second stage compressor (C-2) to increase its pressure from 6.63
to 15.60 bar. The outflow of C-2 is cooled down to 32 °C by CW-
1 with the cooling water. Next, it goes into the flash drum (F-3)
together with a mixed vapor flow from the evaporators (E-1
through E-5). The refrigerant will be flashed in F-3 into vapor
and liquid streams again. A short-cut stream from the vapor
stream of F-3 goes through the coolers (CO-1, CO-6 and CO-7)
sequentially to reduce its temperature to −14.0 °C. After that,
this short-cut stream is mixed with the stream from an evaporator
(E-7) and used to chill down a process stream in E-6; and then
the outlet stream is directed to F-2. The remaining vapor stream
from F-3 will go to the inlet of the third stage compressor (C-3).
Through C-3, the MR is compressed from 15.60 to 35.00 bar.
Then, the MR is partially condensed to 32.8 °C at CW-2 by the
cooling water. MR is separated to the LMR (the vapor outflow
from the flash drum F-4) with the lower boiling point and HMR
(the liquid outflows from F-4) with the higher boiling point. The
compositions of LMR and HMR streams are listed in Table 2,
where the composition of the LMR stream include 0.013 wt %
H2, 15.4 wt % CH4, 22.8 wt % C2H4 and 61.8 wt % C3H6, whereas
the composition of the HMR stream include 0.001 wt % H2, 3.0
wt % CH4, 11.8 wt % C2H4 and 85.2 wt % C3H6.
Table 2. Refrigerant Compositions of CRS and MRS
CRS Refrigerant (wt
%) MRS Refrigerant (wt %)
Composition C3 cycle C2 cycle MR LMR HMR
Hydrogen 0.00003 0.0001 0.00001
Methane 5.3 15.4 3.0
Ethylene 100.0 13.8 22.8 11.8
Propylene 100.0 80.9 61.8 85.2
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The LMR stream is first condensed by a condenser (CO-4)
and subcooled by a subcooler (CO-9) after flashing in F-4. Then,
the LMR stream is split into two parallel streams. The two
parallel streams pass though expansion valves to reduce their
pressures to 1.68 bar and supply cooling to evaporators (E-11
and E-12), separately. After that, the LMR stream continues to
provide cooling to an evaporator (E-10) and merges with a
stream from the HMR side before supplying cooling in an
evaporator (E-9). Finally, the LMR stream is sent to the flash
drum of the first stage compressor (F-1). On the other hand, the
HMR stream is first chilled by a subcooler (CO-5) before
splitting into several paths. Three of the split streams accounting
about 13% of the HMR flow rate will decrease their pressures to
15.6 bar through their expansion valves. Then, they are utilized in
parallel in three evaporators (E-1, E-2 and E-3) to refrigerate
process streams with the highest temperature-range level from
43.3 to 27.0 °C. After that, this part of HMR is merged with
another part of HMR from an evaporator (E-4) and then directed
to the inlet of F-3. The remaining stream of the HMR stream
from CO-5 will be further cooled down to 18.1 °C in a subcooler
(CO-3) after passing an expansion valve and separated into two
streams. One separated stream, which has 24% of the flow rate of
the HMR, will be depressured to 15.6 bar before chilling process
streams in evaporators of E-5 and E-4 sequentially; and then it
merges other HMR streams from E-1 through E-3. The second
separated stream from CO-3 with a relative higher flow rate will
be further cooled down to 3.9 °C in a subcooler (CO-2) and split
into three more streams: (i) One split stream passes through an
expansion valve to reduce its pressure to 1.68 bar, goes through
subcooler (CO-8) and mixes with the LMR stream from E-10.
(ii) The second split stream also reduces its pressure to 1.68 bar
and provides the cooling to the process stream in an evaporator
(E-8). After that, it merges with the LMR from E-9 and flows to
F-1. (iii) The third split stream reduces its pressure to 11.50 bar
and chills a process stream in an evaporator (E-7). After that, it
merges with the short-cut stream from CO-7 and continues to
serve in an evaporator (E-6) before entering inlet of F-2.
Through all the described operations, the cooling/heating
demands from process streams, which are the exact same as
those from existing CRS, are well served.
In the new developed MRS, the interexchangers I-1, I-2 and I-3
that heat integrates propylene refrigeration subsystem with
ethylene refrigeration subsystem in the CRS are not needed
anymore. Thus, fewer heat exchangers are used in the MRS.
Furthermore, the MRS employs only one compressor with three
stages, compared with two compressors with different numbers
of stages used in the existing CRS. This results in the saving of
one compressor and a set of suction drums. Another advantage of
MRS is that the setting for the pressure levels is more flexible
than that of CRS, i.e., although only one compressor with three
stages is adopted in MRS, six pressure levels can exist in the
whole refrigeration process. Although pressure levels in the
original CRS need be corresponded with the number of stage of
compressors, i.e., the propylene compressor with four stages
supplies five pressure levels in the propylene subsystem of CRS,
and the ethylene compressor with three stages provides four
pressure levels in the ethylene subsystem of CRS. This merit of
MRS is due to the application of sequential evaporations in the
MRS, a refrigerant stream after served once, is adjusted to
another pressure level to serve another process stream
sequentially. For example, the HMR in Figure 9 continues
serving evaporator E-6 after it provides the cooling duty to
evaporator E-7 and decreases the pressure to another pressure
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Figure 10. 3D plot of the B-T chart of the new developed MRS.

Figure 11. 2D plot of the B-T chart of new developed MRS.

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Table 3. Compressor Operation Comparisons between CRS and MRS

Outlet Pressure (bar) Compression Ratio Shaft Work (kW)
Compressor No. CRS MRS CRS MRS CRS MRS
HC-1/C-1 18.48 6.10 2.68 3.63 3398.90 2831.01
HC-2/C-2 10.78 15.6 2.01 2.56 1792.65 3827.10
HC-3/C-3 7.23 35.0 1.49 2.24 2254.554 3723.13
HC-4 3.59 1.71 1887.28
LC-1 17.52 1.34 432.36
LC-2 11.21 1.38 1569.87
LC-3 4.05 1.36 361.19
Total 11696.8 10381.25
Savings with MRS 11.2%

level. In the CRS, only parallel evaporation is used, e.g., the inlet ratio and shaft work, are summarized in Table 3. Only one three-
and outlet temperatures of process streams in evaporators E-1, E- stage compressor is used in MRS, whereas two multistage
2 and E-3 are close, the refrigerant stream can be split into 3 compressors are used in CRS. It shows that 1315.55 kW of the
streams with different flow rates to cool down these process total brake power is saved in MRS compared with CRS, which
streams in parallel and merged into one stream after the accounts for nearly 11.2% savings.
evaporation processes. Also, note that shortcut streams from the To compare the economic performance of CRS and MRS, the
vapor outlet of flash drums are employed in both refrigeration costs of capital cost (i.e., UBMC given by eq 10) and utility cost
systems. are calculated and shown in Table 4. As shown, seven major
Figure 10 shows a 3D view of the B-T chart of the new
developed MRS. Three pairs of saturated liquid and vapor lines, Table 4. Economic Performance Comparisons between CRS
corresponding to the MR, LMR and HMR streams, are also and MRS
depicted in Figure 10. To obtain these saturated liquid and vapor
Items CRS MRS MRS Savings
lines, rigorous simulations in Aspen Plus are performed. As
streams in MRS sometimes are mixed or separated, the Number of Major Units 35 28 20.0%
composition of refrigerant in each unit of the entire system is Capital Cost (UBMC, $106)
usually different, which can be observed in the 3D figure. Note Compressor 25.80 20.04 22.3%
that according to the difference of stream compositions, all Heat Exchanger 1.85 1.80 3.0%
streams in the developed CRS can be classified into seven types Vessel 1.34 1.06 21.4%
of streams. Each type of stream will have different thermody- Sub Total 28.99 22.90 21.0%
namic performance in the B-T chart. For simplicity, the saturated Utility Cost ($106/yr)
Electricity 11.11 9.87 11.2%
vapor and liquid lines of three main types of streams (MR, LMR
Cooling Water 0.14 0.12 14.3%
and HMR) are plotted in Figure 10 as the boundaries of three
Sub Total 11.25 9.89 12.1%
shadowed areas. Based on simulation results, the important
operating states of MRS marked in Figure 9 are mapped into
Figure 10, where specific exergy pathways of the refrigerant pieces of equipment are saved in the newly developed MRS
streams are plotted in the same colors corresponding to the compared with the existing CRS, mainly one compressor, four
process flowsheet in Figure 9. In Figure 10, those three pairs of flash drums and two heat exchangers. Consequently, the total
saturated liquid and vapor lines of the MR, LMR and HMR capital cost of the developed MRS can be reduced by 21.0%, in
streams form three separated shadowed areas. The operating which the capital cost of compressors has been significantly
lines of the refrigerant streams sharing the same composition are reduced by 22.3% because only one compressor is needed in
on the same shadowed area. Any operating status change of MRS instead of two different compressors employed in CRS.
refrigerant streams including temperature, pressure, or compo- Furthermore, the total utility cost including the cooling water
sition changes will result in an operating line within or between and electricity is also saved by 12.1% with the developed MRS.
these three shadowed areas. Therefore, the new developed MRS has great advantages over
To view conveniently and quantitatively the changes of the the existing CRS in terms of both capital and utility costs.
specific exergy, it is better to project the 3D profile in Figure 10 It should be noted that CRS is still widely applied in most
into the same B-T plane as shown in Figure 11. The evaporator ethylene plants due to many reasons. First, although MRS has
E-7 is still employed as the example to compare the exergy been studied for a long time and applied in LNG, separation of
efficiency between the proposed MRS and the existing CRS. It air, the liquefaction of nitrogen and etc., the report of the
can be seen that the temperature of the refrigerant increases as application and the design of MRS in ethylene plants is seldom
the temperature of the process stream decreases during the heat reported due to the complexities of ethylene plants and
exchanging process. The temperature difference at the hot refrigerant systems or possible intellectual copyright concerns.
stream inlet is only 5.1 °C, which is 21.8 °C lower than that in the Second, a lot of ethylene plants using CRS were built decades
existing CRS. ago. They are not viable to be upgraded to use MRS because of
4.3. Comparisons of the Two Refrigeration Systems. To process or economic constraints. Furthermore, operating an
illustrate further the thermodynamic efficiency, the comparison MRS needs highly skilled engineers and operators, which might
of the compressor work consumption in the CRS and MRS has be another difficulty for many existing ethylene plants to deal
been studied. The operating conditions of compressors in both with. As mentioned, public studies on MRS applied in ethylene
CRS and MRS, including the discharge pressure, compression plant are very few. Our work to analyze comprehensively the
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thermodynamic nature of complicated CRS and MRS would
promote the in-depth study and help the industry. It should be
also noted that this paper developed a methodology for the
conceptual design based on authors’ thermodynamic under-
standings to share the idea with ethylene process research
communities. The case study has no real industrial data to
compare the performance of existing MRS and the MRS
developed in our case study. Meanwhile, all the results shown in
the paper are based on virtual simulations for a particular case,
which should be treated as preliminary and subject to a variety of
risks, uncertainties and assumptions.
5. CONCLUDING REMARKS
The design of refrigeration systems is very important to chemical
and petrochemical industries, which significantly affect the
capital cost and energy efficiency. In this paper, a general
methodology has been proposed for the process synthesis of a
tertiary refrigerant MRS containing a mixture of methane,
ethylene and propylene that satisfies all the cooling/heating
requirements the traditional ethylene−propylene CRS serves in
typical ethylene plants. In the proposed methodology, the
exergy-temperature chart combined with the exergy analysis is
presented to analyze comprehensively the thermodynamic
nature of the refrigeration system. Furthermore, the comparison
of the economic performance of the developed MRS and existing
CRS are conducted. The efficacy of the developed methodology
is demonstrated through a case study, where the capital and
utility costs are respectively saved by 21.0% and 12.1%; the
compressor shaft work is also reduced by 11.2% compared with
the CRS base.
■
AUTHOR INFORMATION
Corresponding Author
*Prof. Qiang Xu (Phone: 409-880-7818; Fax: 409-880-2197; E-
mail: Qiang.xu@lamar.edu).
ORCID
Qiang Xu: 0000-0002-2252-0838
Notes
The authors declare no competing financial interest.
■
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was supported in part by Texas Air Research Center
(TARC), the Center for Advances in Water and Air Quality at
Lamar University, and Anita Riddle Faculty Fellowship from
Lamar University, as well as the President Visionary Project from
Lamar University.
■
NOMENCLATURE
Indices
I = Chemical Engineering Plant Index of current year
Io = Chemical Engineering Plant Index of mid-1968
m = Index of stage of the compressor
Parameters and Variables
α = Exponent of the ratio of equipment capacity
β = Exponent of the ratio of length of the cylindrical pressure
vessel
γ = Exponent of the ratio of diameter of the cylindrical
pressure vessel
B = Specific flow exergy of a fluid (kJ/mol)
BMC = Bare model cost ($)
C = Base cost of a piece of equipment at the capacity q ($)
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Co = Base cost of a piece of equipment at the referenced
capacity qo ($)
D = Diameter of the cylindrical pressure vessel (ft)
Do = Diameter of the referenced cylindrical pressure vessel (ft)
H = Enthalpy (kJ/mol)
IC = Installation cost ($)
L = Length of the cylindrical pressure vessel (ft)
Lo = Length of the referenced cylindrical pressure vessel (ft)
MF = Module factor in Guthrie method
MPF = Materials and pressure correction factor of the
equipment
TIC = Total installed cost ($)
UBMC = Updated bare module cost ($)
UC = Uninstalled cost ($)
q = Capacity of the equipment
q = Capacity of the referenced equipment
S = Entropy (kJ/mol)
Ta = Ambient temperature (K)
n = Total number of stage of the compressor
ΔB = Specific flow exergy change of a fluid (kJ/mol)
ΔH = Enthalpy change (kJ/mol)
ΔS = Entropy change (kJ/mol)
■
REFERENCES
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Ind. Eng. Chem. Res. 2017, 56, 7984−7999