Sharif Digital Repository

Optimization of ethane recovery in Phases 4 and 5 of Assalouyeh was studied. The influence of some parameters on the ethane recovery and the sensitivity analysis were determined. The effect of the parameter variation on the neighboring unit showed that a significant energy saving for compressor power consumption could be achieved. Some of the operating conditions of this unit were modified, including columns pressure, split fraction, minimum approach temperature, and expander power. This led to a 6% increase in ethane yield. This is an abstract of a paper presented at the 18th International Congress of Chemical and Process Engineering (Prague, Czech Republic 8/24-28/2008)  

The effective parameters such as particle size, temperature, pressure and extraction time on supercritical carbon dioxide extraction of cocoa butter form cocoa seed were studied in order to find the optimum conditions for extraction. Particle size from whole cocoa nibs to one millimeter diameter, extraction temperature from 35°C to 55°C, extraction time from 2 to 8 hours and extraction pressure from 5 to 20 MPa were investigated and optimized. The optimum results (according to the limitation of the apparatus) of 5.2% extraction efficiency, suggests that pure CO2 is not a suitable solvent for extraction of cocoa butter in the investigated range of parameters and therefore the use of a... 

Impurities such as hydrogen sulfide, water vapor and heavy hydrocarbons in natural gas have considerable effects on the membrane performance. Small amounts of condensable and polymer soluble components in the feed gas cause swelling or plasticization of glassy membranes, leading to a reduction in membrane selectivity. In the present research the influence of ethane was investigated on the permeance and selectivity of two commercially available hollow fiber membranes, namely Cardo-type polyimide and PPO hollow fibers for CO 2/CH 4 separations. It was concluded that the gas mixture permeation rate was increased in the presence of C 2H 6. However, the CO 2/CH 4 separation factors remained... 

A two-dimensional non-isothermal mathematical model has been developed for the ethane dehydrogenation reaction in a fixed-bed catalytic membrane reactor. Since ethane dehydrogenation is an equilibrium reaction, removal of produced hydrogen by the membrane shifts the thermodynamic equilibrium to ethylene production. For further displacement of the dehydrogenation reaction, oxidative dehydrogenation method has been used. Since ethane dehydrogenation is an endothermic reaction, the energy produced by the oxidative dehydrogenation method is consumed by the dehydrogenation reaction. The results show that the oxidative dehydrogenation method generated a substantial improvement in the reactor... 

An industrial-scale reactor for ethylene production was modeled using the oxidative dehydrogenation of ethane (ODHE) in a multi-tubular reactor system, examining a variety of parameters affecting reactor performance. The model showed that a double-bed multi-tubular reactor with intermediate air injection scheme was superior to a single-bed design, due to the increased ethylene selectivity while operating under lower oxygen partial pressures. The optimized reactor length for 100% oxygen conversion was theoretically determined for both reactor designs. The use of a distributed oxygen feed with a limited number of injection points indicated a significant improvement on the reactor performance... 

The 3A zeolites are excellent adsorbents for industrial-scale gas dehydration because of the low energy required for regeneration and ease of operation. A computational study of the dehydration of an industrial feed stream containing ethane and water was performed using an in-house code that included an appropriate equilibrium adsorption isotherm. The validated computational model was used to examine the impact of particle size on the process dynamics and the corresponding pressure drop. The water concentration along the adsorption column was also investigated. To increase the process capacity, the packed adsorption bed was divided into two distinct layers, which were operated with different... 

The hydrogen abstraction reaction of the OH radical with CH 3CHF2 (HFC152-a) has been studied theoretically over a wide temperature range, 200-3000 K. Two different reactive sites of the molecule, CH3 and CHF2 groups have been investigated precisely, and results confirm that CHF2 position of the molecule is a highly reactive site. In this study, three recently developed hybrid density functional theories, namely, MPWB1K, MPW1B95, and MPW1K, are used. The MPWB1K/6-31+G(d,p) method gives the best result for kinetic calculations, including barrier heights, reaction path information and geometry of transition state structures and other stationary points. To refine the barrier height of each... 

In this study, a fixed-bed catalytic membrane reactor was used for the production of ethylene and cyclohexane from ethane and benzene. A two-dimensional non-isothermal mathematical model was used for estimating the performance of the membrane reactor. Furthermore, the effect of inlet temperature (720–1080 K), feed molar ratio (3–10) and the reactor spacetime (1–76 kgCat.s/mol) was studied on the conversion of ethane to ethylene and benzene to cyclohexane. The results of modeling showed that with the increase of inlet temperature the conversion of both (de)-hydrogenation reactions increased and the 95% of ethane conversion was achieved when the molar ratio of benzene/ethane was fixed on 3.... 

The objective of the work ahead is presentation of a new carbon paste electrode (CPE) modified by TiO2 nanoparticles (TiO2NPs) and 1,2-bis-[o-aminophenyl thio] ethane (APTE) ligand as a selective cation receptor for determination of the Cd (II) ions using differential pulse anodic stripping voltammetry (DPASV). The electrode shows an excellent tendency to Cd (II) ions in presence of some interfering species. Under the optimum conditions, a linear calibration curve was obtained in the concentration range of 2.9 nM to 4.6 μM with a correlation coefficient of 0.9969 in the anodic potential of 0.54 (V vs. Ag/AgCl). The metal detection limit was 2.0 nM after 10 min preconcentration (S/N = 3). The... 

We report a density functional non-equilibrium Green's function study of electrical transport in a single molecular conductor consisting of an ethane-dithiolate (C2H4S2) molecular wire with two sulfur end groups bonded to the Au(1 1 1) electrodes. We show that the current was increased by increasing the external voltage biases. The projected density of states (PDOS) and transmission coefficients T(E) under various external voltage biases are analyzed, and it suggests that the variation of the coupling between the molecule and the electrodes with external bias leads to the increase of the current. Furthermore, the investigation of the transport properties of the pentane-dithiolate (C5H10S2)... 

Despite the fact that humidification-dehumidification (HDH) desalination systems can be driven by various renewable or waste heat energies, many of the available renewable technologies are expensive in some parts of the globe. Hence, proposing and developing high-efficient mechanical-based HDH units can be an encouraging alternative which is more highlighted in recent investigations. In pursuance of this objective, three innovative mechanical-driven HDH units are simulated and the results are compared with each other. The simulated hybrid desalination system consists of a HDH unit and an ethane ejector expander transcritical refrigeration cycle (ethane-EETRC). The simulated hybrid systems... 

In this study, mathematical modelling of oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) to C 2 hydrocarbons (C 2H 6 and C 2H 4) over La 2O 3/CaO catalyst in a fixed-bed reactor operated under isothermal and non-isothermal conditions was investigated using the MATLAB program. In this process, methane and acetylene were the inputted feed and ethane, ethylene, propylene, propane, i-butane and n-butane were the output products. The amount of methane conversion obtained was 12.7% for the former feed however; if pure methane was inputted this conversion rose to 13.8%. Furthermore, the plasma process would enhance the conversion, selectivity towards desired product and process yield. A comparison between the... 

A gas-phase heterogeneous kinetics is described over perovskite with formula La0.6Sr0.4Co0.8Fe0.2O3-δ (LSCF) for the oxidative coupling of methane under differential conversion conditions in a microcatalytic fixed-bed reactor. The ethane (C2H6) and carbon oxides (COX) formation and methane conversion rates were obtained as a function of methane and oxygen partial pressure under experimental conditions of: 0.20 < PC H4 < 0.82 atm, 0.04 < PO2 < 0.15 atm, and 1073 < T < 1173 K. The different kinetic models were examined and two Eley-Rideal mechanisms (a and b) were successfully performed to fit the experimental data into the theoretical relations from which two mechanisms having a first step of...