AN ENERGY CONSUMPTION COMPARISON BETWEEN SEPARATION PROCESSES FOR AROMATICS OBTENTION FROM AROMATICS RICH HYDROCARBON MIXTURES

Abstract

This work aims the comparison of energy consumption between two petrochemical routes i. e. AROSOLVAN and DISTAPEX. Both are wide used routes for aromatics production form hydrocarbon rich mixtures. As raw material was chosen a reformate mixrure richh in the three major substances namely benzene, toluene, and xylenes. The mixture of these aromatics is the main product and is known as BTX. The solvent is N-methyl-2-pirrolidone (NMP). For the analysis both processes were modeled in the software ASPEN PLUS^®. It was also studied the influence of other solvents. As result for the AROSOLVAN process it was obtained a heat consumption of 485,6 kcal/kg of BTX and 70 m³/h of cooling water. For the DISTAPEX process the heat comsumption was 430,8 kcal/kg ofe BTX and 102 m³/h of cooling water. As can be seen both processes are equivalent in the matter of energy consumption.