초록 ▼

A process is described for nitrogen recovery from air using vacuum swing adsorption. The process minimizes capital costs by reducing or eliminating gas storage vessels and reduces power requirements by operating without an air feed compressor or elevated pressure feed, whereby air feed is induced by

A process is described for nitrogen recovery from air using vacuum swing adsorption. The process minimizes capital costs by reducing or eliminating gas storage vessels and reduces power requirements by operating without an air feed compressor or elevated pressure feed, whereby air feed is induced by vacuum conditions achieved by pressure equalization between parallel adsorption beds. Alternatively, a minor amount of oxygen product can be recovered.

대표청구항 ▼

A process for the production of high purity nitrogen from air using a plurality of parallel adsorption beds which comprises: (a) drawing ambient air through the feed end of a first bed of adsorbent by connecting the effluent end of said bed to the effluent end of a parallel bed, which is presently f

A process for the production of high purity nitrogen from air using a plurality of parallel adsorption beds which comprises: (a) drawing ambient air through the feed end of a first bed of adsorbent by connecting the effluent end of said bed to the effluent end of a parallel bed, which is presently fully evacuated, so as to selectively adsorb nitrogen on said first bed of adsorbent and allow oxygen to pass through said first bed; (b) cocurrently rinsing said first bed with high purity nitrogen to remove any co-adsorbed oxygen and void space oxygen from said bed; (c) countercurrently evacuating said first bed to a subatmospheric pressure to recover a high purity nitrogen product and a rinse gas for another of said plurality of beds presently undergoing step (b); (d) countercurrently repressurizing said first bed by connecting the effluent end of said first bed at its subatmospheric pressure at the end of step (c) with the effluent end of another of said plurality of beds presently undergoing the ambient air adsorption of step (a), and (e) continuing this series of steps with the plurality of beds to form a continuous process for production of high purity nitrogen.