Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Oxidation Reactions
Petrotemex
July 21, 2005
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Praxair Commercial Oxygen Addition
Experience
Air Enrichment
PTA
Phenol
Acrylonitrile
Maleic anhydride
Phthalic anhydride
Direct Injection
Nitric acid
Caprolactam
Acrylonitrile
Maleic anhydride
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Approaches to Oxygen Addition
Praxair offers two
technologies for PTA
Air Enrichment (AE) – Vent
commercially practiced for
PTA
Direct Oxygen Injection
(DOI) – in development for
PTA Feed Product
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Air Enrichment - Methodology
Typical AE Process
Vent
Increase O2 concentration
in air feed up to 30%
Typically to ~25% oxygen
Increase feed flow
Maintain constant oxygen
concentration in headspace
Feed Product
AE Installation
Easy retrofit
Air
Oxygen source
Oxygen flow control skid Compressor Reactor
Air line tee
Oxygen injector Oxygen
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Air Enrichment - Benefits
Production Increase
Capacity increases of 13-25% can be achieved
when the air is enriched to 25% oxygen
Capacity increase will depend on the particular
customer’s bottleneck
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Direct Injection - Methodology
Technology is in development for PTA
Process
Oxygen injected directly into the reactor into oxygen-starved zones
Increase or maintain feed flow
Maintain constant oxygen concentration in headspace
Installation
Requires adding oxygen injector into the reactor
Special skid and sparger to prevent hydrocarbon backflow
Vent
Feed Product
Production Increase
Increased capacity of up to 32% can be possible
Byproduct Reduction
Oxygen supplied to oxygen deficient regions of the reactor
Decrease reactions associated with oxygen starvation
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Commercial Demonstration - Air
Enrichment
Demonstrated at a U.S. TPA Plant
Enrichment used to gain a production
increase (capital deferment)
Safety Review
Modeling was done to predict the effect of
enrichment of oxygen concentration in the vent
stream
Materials Compatibility
Praxair’s Materials Engineering Labs conducted a
full analysis
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Commercial Demonstration - Air
Enrichment
Successfully Increased Production
Capacity with Oxygen Enrichment
Enrichment to 25% Oxygen
Increased Capacity by 17%
No increase in impurities
Product quality increased slightly with
enriched air
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Oxygen Enrichment – Customer
Benefits
Production Increase Achieved 13% 17% 25%
Assumptions:
PTA Sales Price - $984/tonne
p-xylene cost - $1004/tonne
Acetic Acid cost -$772/tonne
Oxygen Cost - $55/tonne
Oxygen cost varies depending on local conditions, including power cost
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Summary
Capacity increases of 13-15% can be
achieved with Air Enrichment
Air Enrichment requires no reactor
modifications and low capital investment
Praxair’s engineering design includes a
safety analysis of the oxygen skid and
oxygen injectors
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL
Next Steps?
BUSINESS CONFIDENTIAL