Written on August 1, 2014 at 12:00 am, by Clyde Young
The first pillar of Risk Based Process Safety Management is “Commitment to Process Safety.” A formalized mentoring system can ensure workforce involvement, compliance with company and regulatory requirements, increase the competency of personnel and enhance the process safety culture of the entire organization. Within this element there are several essential features that lead to aContinue Reading
Hydrogen sulfide and carbon dioxide are the principal objectionable acid gas constituents often present in natural gas, synthetic gas, and various refinery gas streams. These acid gas constituents must be removed for corrosion prevention in gas pipelines and process equipment and for health and safety reasons. Reference [1] provides current acceptable concentration levels for theseContinue Reading
Unlike the natural gas compressors which rely upon recycling the after-cooled compressed gas to compressor suction for surge prevention, the surge control in refrigeration systems is quite different because the refrigerant vapors are compressed only to their saturation pressure for dew point temperature, which when cooled for recycling immediately condense into a liquid. Consequently, theContinue Reading
The details of a simple single-stage refrigeration system, a two-stage refrigeration system employing one flash tank economizer, and with heat exchanger economizer system are given in Chapter 15 of Gas Conditioning and Processing, Volume 2 [1]. In the January 2008 Tip of the Month (TOTM) [2], we compared the performance of a simple refrigeration systemContinue Reading
Written on April 1, 2014 at 8:00 am, by Wes Wright
This Tip of the Month describes simple equations to approximate changes to the properties of crude oil with changing temperature. Changes in crude oil density and specific heat, or heat capacity, can be estimated from graphs and/or more elaborate computer simulation. The latter generally requires access to a process simulator and characterization data for theContinue Reading
In the January, February, and March 2012 tips of the month (TOTM) we discussed the transportation of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the dense phase region. We illustrated how thermophysical properties changed in the dense phase and studied their impacts on pressure drop calculations. We showed that the effect of the numerical range of values forContinue Reading
Written on January 1, 2014 at 8:00 am, by Clyde Young
A pillar of Risk Based Process Safety (RBPS) is Learn from Experience. The work we do and the processes we use to analyze our work provide significant learning opportunities to enhance process safety competency. This is a derivative of Kolb’s experiential learning cycle [1], but many times we fail to take advantage of the learningContinue Reading
TEG Vaporization Losses In this Tip of The Month (TOTM), the effect of striping gas rate and triethylene glycol (TEG) circulation ratio on the TEG vaporization loss from the regenerator top and contactor top is investigated. Specifically, this study focuses on the variation of TEG vaporization losses with reboiler pressure, TEG circulation ratio and strippingContinue Reading
In this Tip of The Month (TOTM), the effect of striping gas rate and TEG circulation ratio on the still column top temperature for regeneration of rich triethylene glycol (TEG) is investigated. Specifically, this study focuses on the variation of still column top temperature with reboiler pressure, TEG circulation ratio and stripping gas rate. ByContinue Reading
In this Tip of The Month (TOTM), regeneration of rich triethylene glycol (TEG) with striping gas at high pressure is investigated. Specifically, this study focusses on the determination of the required stripping gas rate as a function of the lean TEG mass percent, reboiler temperature, and the number of theoretical trays in the stripping sectionContinue Reading
