Apparatus and system for swing adsorption processes related thereto

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10220346-B2
Application number	US-201615284982-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 4, 2016
Priority date	Oct 27, 2015
Publication date	Mar 5, 2019
Grant date	Mar 5, 2019

Abstract

Provided are apparatus and systems for performing a swing adsorption process. This swing adsorption process may involve passing streams through adsorbent bed units to treat the feed stream to remove certain contaminants from the stream. In the method and system, active valves may be used with passive valves to manage the flow of the streams through the adsorbent bed units.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A process for removing contaminants from a feed stream, the process comprising:
a) performing one or more adsorption steps in an adsorbent bed unit, wherein each of the one or more adsorption steps comprise: (i) opening one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves to pass a gaseous feed stream from a feed inlet conduit to an adsorbent bed disposed in an interior region of a housing of the adsorbent bed unit, (ii) exposing the gaseous feed stream to the adsorbent bed to separate one or more contaminants from the gaseous feed stream to form a product stream, and (iii) opening one or more passively-controlled product valves to conduct away the product stream from the interior region in the housing to a product conduit, wherein each of the one or more passively-controlled product valves operate in phase with at least one of the one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves;
b) performing one or more depressurization steps, wherein each of the one or more depressurization steps comprise conducting away at least a portion of the one or more contaminants in an output stream; and
c) repeating the steps a) to b) for at least one additional cycle, wherein cycle duration is for a period greater than 1 second and less than 600 seconds;
wherein opening the one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves further comprises linearly moving with a feed actuating mechanism at least one feed valve stem to provide a feed opening between a feed disk element coupled to the at least one feed valve stem and a feed seat that is inserted within a head of the housing of the adsorbent bed unit.

2. The process of claim 1 , wherein the opening one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves further comprise linearly moving a feed lift plate secured to a plurality of feed valve stems with a feed actuating mechanism to provide a plurality of feed openings, wherein each of the plurality of feed valve stems is secured to a feed disk element and each of the plurality of feed openings forms a gap between the feed disk element and an associated feed seat that is inserted within the head of the housing of the adsorbent bed unit.

3. The process of claim 2 , wherein opening the one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves further comprise providing a first feed flow path for the gaseous feed stream through a first feed opening of the plurality of feed openings prior to providing a second feed flow path through a second feed opening of the plurality of feed openings.

4. The process of claim 1 , wherein the opening one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves further comprises moving the feed disk element away from the adsorbent bed to form a gap between the feed disk element and the associated feed seat.

5. The process of claim 1 , further comprising applying pressure on the feed disk element for each of the one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves based on a pressure differential between the feed inlet conduit and the interior region to hinder leakage from the one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves during the performing one or more depressurization steps.

6. The process of claim 1 , wherein opening one or more passively-controlled product valves further comprise linearly moving with a product biasing mechanism at least one product valve stem to provide a product opening between a product disk element coupled to the at least one product valve stem and a product seat secured to the housing of the adsorbent bed unit.

7. The process of claim 6 , wherein the product biasing mechanism is configured to move linearly based on a pressure differential between the interior region and the product conduit exceeding a specific threshold.

8. The process of claim 6 , wherein the opening one or more passively-controlled product valves further comprises moving the product disk element away from the adsorbent bed to form a gap between the product disk element and the product seat.

9. The process of claim 6 , further comprising applying pressure on the product disk element for each of the one or more passively-controlled product valves from a product pressure differential between the interior region and the product conduit to hinder leakage from the one or more passively-controlled product valves during the performing one or more depressurization steps.

10. The process of claim 1 , wherein opening one or more passively-controlled product valves further comprise moving a flexible strip to provide a product opening between the flexible strip and a product seat.

11. The process of claim 1 , wherein the performing one or more depressurization steps comprises performing one or more purge steps, wherein each of the one or more purge steps comprise passing a purge stream into the adsorbent bed unit to conduct away at least a portion of the one or more contaminants in a purge output stream.

12. The process of claim 11 , wherein each of the one or more purge steps comprise: (i) opening one or more actively-controlled purge vent poppet valves to conduct away the purge outlet stream from the adsorbent bed, (ii) exposing the purge stream to the adsorbent bed to separate the at least a portion of the one or more contaminants from the adsorbent bed to form the purge output stream, and (iii) opening one or more passively-controlled purge poppet valves to pass the purge stream to the interior region from a purge conduit.

13. The process of claim 1 , wherein the opening one or more passively-controlled product valves is within at least 80% of the time interval for the opening one or more actively-controlled feed poppet valves.

14. The process of claim 1 , further comprising performing one or more heating steps after performing the one or more adsorption steps, wherein each of the one or more heating steps comprises passing a heating stream at a heating temperature into the adsorbent bed.

15. The process of claim 1 , wherein the gaseous feed stream is a hydrocarbon containing stream having greater than one volume percent hydrocarbons based on the total volume of the feed stream.

16. The process of claim 1 , wherein the gaseous feed stream is provided at a feed pressure in the range between 50 bar absolute (bara) and 150 bara and at a feed temperature in the range between 0° F. and 200° F.

17. The process of claim 1 , wherein the cycle duration is greater than 2 seconds and less than 180 seconds.

18. A swing adsorption system for removing contaminants from a gaseous feed stream, the system comprising:
an adsorbent bed unit configured to separate contaminants from a gaseous feed stream and to output a product stream in a swing adsorption process, wherein the adsorbent bed unit comprises:
a housing forming an interior region;
an adsorbent bed disposed within the interior region;
one or more actively-controlled poppet valves, wherein each of the one or more actively-controlled poppet valves is configured to provide a first fluid flow passage through an opening in the housing via the actively-controlled poppet valve between the interior region and a first location external to the interior region;
an actuating mechanism coupled to the one or more actively-controlled poppet valves, wherein the actuating mechanism is configured to linearly move at least one active valve stem associated with at least one active disk element for each of the one or more actively-controlled poppet valves to provide an opening between an active disk element coupled to at least one active valve stem and an associated active seat that is inserted within a head of the housing of the adsorbent bed unit;

Assignees

• Fowler Tracy A
• Huntington Richard A
• Fulton John W
• Exxonmobil Upstream Res Co

Inventors

• Fowler Tracy A
• Huntington Richard A
• Fulton John W

Classifications

• B01D2259/40003

  Methods relating to valve switching · CPC title

• B01D2257/80

  Water · CPC title

• B01D53/0473 Primary

  Rapid pressure swing adsorption · CPC title

• B01D53/0446 Primary

  Means for feeding or distributing gases · CPC title

• B01D2257/504

  Carbon dioxide · CPC title