Hollow fibers as structured packing for olefin/paraffin distillation

D. Yang, D. Devlin, R. Barbero, R. Wright, E. Cussler

Research output: Contribution to conferencePaperpeer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

The use of non-selective hollow fibers as a new type of structured packing materials in a distillation column was studied for olefin/paraffin separation. The < 40 cm long column yielded > 8% enrichment of propylene from a 30% propane/70% propylene mixture; and > 20% enrichment of iso-butane from a 50% n-butane/50% iso-butane mixture. It has the height of a transfer unit (HTU) as low as 10 cm and an overall mass transfer coefficient > 0.01 cm/sec with the transfer resistance mainly coming from the vapor phase. The low HTU was due to the high mass transfer area per unit volume, over 1100 sq m/cu m. The compatibility between hollow fiber polymer and light hydrocarbon solvent on the separation performance in the distillation process was also studied. The effect of morphology of hollow fibers on the separation efficiency in olefin/paraffin distillation is presented. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 8th World Congress of Chemical Engineering (Montréal, Quebec, Canada 8/23-27/2009).

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages512a
StatePublished - 2009
Event8th World Congress of Chemical Engineering: Incorporating the 59th Canadian Chemical Engineering Conference and the 24th Interamerican Congress of Chemical Engineering - Montreal, QC, Canada
Duration: Aug 23 2009Aug 27 2009

Other

Other8th World Congress of Chemical Engineering: Incorporating the 59th Canadian Chemical Engineering Conference and the 24th Interamerican Congress of Chemical Engineering
Country/TerritoryCanada
CityMontreal, QC
Period8/23/098/27/09

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