Sulfur Recovery in Petrochemical or Natural Gas Plants
Recovery done right
Oxygen Enrichment for Claus Plants
With the growing need to process sour crudes, petrochmical producers and natural gas processors face the two-fold challenge of removing increased sulfur content to meet strict environmental regulations and doing it cost-effectively. Our enhanced combustion technology can help them meet these challenges. It relies on oxygen enrichment to increase the capacity of sulfur recovery units (SRU) in Claus plants, eliminating the need for new, costly sulfur removal units.
Claus plants normally provide up to 98% of the sulfur recovery capability in a petrochemical or natural gas processing operation. To recover the sulfur from sour gas, the Claus plant reaction furnace typically combusts the air and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) that result from sulfur processing. H2S is then partially oxidized and catalytically converted to produce high-purity molten sulfur.
Capacity Gains with Low to High Levels of Enrichment
In a Linde oxygen enrichment system, oxygen is supplied to the Claus plant through a sparger connected to the air line feeding into the reaction furnace. The oxygen can also be injected directly into the furnace through a lance or burner, or feed air can be completely replaced by oxygen supplied from a burner to the furnace. In some cases, complete feed air replacement can double Claus plant capacity. The resulting higher oxygen concentration increases the operating temperature of the furnace, which leads to steadier operation and greater BTEX (benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes) destruction. As a result, the Claus reaction furnace maximizes its ability to combust the oxygen and air mixture and the H2S produced during processing, working with system converters and condensers to recover the sulfur. Increased oxygen also means lower nitrogen volumes, which reduces gas volume in tail gas treatment.
Comprehensive O2e Solution
Further benefits of our sulfur recovery system include increased flexibility as oxygen is available on demand, improved conversion, low-cost installation and energy savings. We offer extensive safety training for proper operation, and use a computer program to help determine the effect of oxygen enrichment on your SRU. We work closely with you to fine-tune piping and sparger design, and to support installation and start-up.
Benefits of Oxygen Enrichment in Claus Plants
- Increased sulfur handling capacity and removal of bottlenecks
- Increased productivity without changing the pressure drop
- Greater flexibility to handle a wider operating envelope with the option to modify process intensification on demand
- More effective treatment of BTEX-containing feeds
- Less effort for tail gas purification (reduced nitrogen flow)
- Greater redundancy - especially with multi-train systems