Process for separating hydrocarbon compounds

摘要

Disclosed herein are processes for producing and separating ethane and ethylene. In some embodiments, an oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) product gas comprising ethane and ethylene is introduced to a separation unit comprising two separators. Within the separation unit, the OCM product gas is separated to provide a C2-rich effluent, a methane-rich effluent, and a nitrogen-rich effluent. Advantageously, in some embodiments the separation is achieved with little or no external refrigeration requirement.

主权项

1. A process for producing hydrocarbon compounds via oxidative coupling of methane (OCM), comprising:
combining a feedstock gas comprising methane with an oxygen-containing gas comprising oxygen to produce a combined gas; bringing the combined gas in contact with an OCM catalyst in an OCM reactor to generate an OCM reactor effluent stream that includes ethylene and unreacted methane; separating the OCM reactor effluent stream into at least a first stream, a second stream, and a third stream; expanding at least a portion of the first stream substantially isentropically to produce an expanded first stream and expanding at least a portion of the third steam substantially isentropically to produce an expanded third stream; directing the expanded first stream and the second stream to a separations unit to separate at least a portion of a mixture of the expanded first stream and the second stream into a first effluent stream comprising ethylene and a second effluent stream comprising unreacted methane, wherein the separations unit is operated at a first temperature that is less than 25° C. and at a first pressure that is greater than 1 atmosphere; and separating at least a portion of the second effluent stream and at least a portion of the expanded third stream in an additional separations unit to provide a methane-rich effluent and a nitrogen-rich effluent.