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CHEE 2404 Unit Operations and Unit Process Equipment: Dr. A. Ghanem

The document provides an overview of unit operations and processes used in modern oil refineries. It lists various physical, thermal, and catalytic processes like distillation, cracking, and hydrotreating. Each process can be broken down into steps based on common unit operations involving fluid dynamics, heat transfer, evaporation, and absorption. Examples of specific unit operations discussed include distillation, drying, mixing, filtration, and reactors.

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Yousef Alipour
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62 views40 pages

CHEE 2404 Unit Operations and Unit Process Equipment: Dr. A. Ghanem

The document provides an overview of unit operations and processes used in modern oil refineries. It lists various physical, thermal, and catalytic processes like distillation, cracking, and hydrotreating. Each process can be broken down into steps based on common unit operations involving fluid dynamics, heat transfer, evaporation, and absorption. Examples of specific unit operations discussed include distillation, drying, mixing, filtration, and reactors.

Uploaded by

Yousef Alipour
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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CHEE 2404

Unit Operations and Unit Process


Equipment
Dr. A. Ghanem
• Lets look at the overall process flow of a
modern oil refinery:
The overall process is broken
down into individual subsets:
Chemical
Physical
Thermal Catalytic
Distillation Visbreaking Hydrotreating
Solvent extraction Delayed coking Catalytic reforming
Propane deasphalting Flexicoking Catalytic cracking
Solvent dewaxing Hydrocracking
Blending Catalytic dewaxing
Alkylation
With their own flow arrangement:
Distillation
Fluid Catalytic Cracking
We notice…..
• The number of individual processes is large,
each one can be broken down into a series of
steps that appear in process after process
• The individual “steps” have common techniques
and are based upon the same scientific
principles
Fluid Dynamics Mixing
Heat Transfer Classification
Evaporation Fluidization
Humidification Filtration
Gas absorption Screening
Solvent Extraction Crystallization
Adsorption Centrifugation
Distillation Comminution
Drying Materials handling
• Fluid dynamics:
– a study of the behaviour of fluids
– In Chemical processes fluid streams flow from
one process to another through pipes and
ducts.
– Process fluids are moved by pumps and
compressors
– Fluid flowrates must be monitored by meters
and are controlled by valves.
• Heat Transfer:
– process fluids may need to be heated up to a certain
temperature
– heat from a process stream may be recovered
– This can be done by contacting two streams in a heat
exchanger.
• Evaporation:
– A special case of heat transfer, where a phase change takes
place.
– Concentrate a solution consisting of a nonvolatile solute and a
volatile solvent
– The volatile solute evaporates leaving a more concentrated
solution.
• Humidification:
– Transfer of material between a pure liquid phase and
a fixed gas phase that is nearly insoluble in the liquid
– Example: Water vapour is added to a air, cooling
tower to decrease water temperature
• Gas absorption
– Also known as stripping or desorption
– a mass transfer operation
– A soluble vapour is absorbed from its mixture with an
inert gas by means of a liquid in which the solute gas
is more soluble.
– Example: the removal of CO2 and H2S from natural
gas or syngas by adsorption into amines or alkaline
salts
• Leaching or Liquid extraction
– Solid extraction involves the dissolving of soluble
matter from its mixture with an insoluble solid
– Liquid extraction is the separation of two miscible
liquids by the use of a solvent that preferentially
dissolves one of them.
– LE an alternative to distillation for difficult separations
– Example: penicillin is separated from fermentation
broth by extraction with butyl acetate
• Distillation
– Production of a vapour by boiling the liquid mixture to
be separated and then condensing the vapours
without returning any to the still. (flash distillation)
– Return part of the condensate to the still under
conditions where it can be in contact with the vapours
on their way to the condenser. (rectification)
– Either operation may be done in batch or continuous
mode.
• Adsorption
– a separation process where the fluid is contacted with
small particles of a porous solid which selectively
adsorbs or complexes with certain components of the
feed.
– The solid adsorbent is usually held in a fixed bed.
• Drying
– Removal of water (usually small amounts) or other
liquid from a solid material to reduce the content of
residual liquid to an acceptable low value
– Water may be removed by presses or centrifuge
(mechanical) or thermally by vaporization
• Agitation and Mixing
– Induced motion of a material in a container
– Random distribution into and through one another, of
two or more initially separate phases.
• Fluidization
– Particle fluid interaction
– When a gas or liquid is passed upward through a bed
of particles, at a certain velocity the particles will
become suspended in the fluid.
• Filtration
– the removal of solid particles from a fluid by passing
the fluid through a filtering medium on which the
solids are deposited.
• Crystallization
– The formation of solid particles within a homogenous
phase
– Formation of solid particles in a vapour, solidification
from a liquid melt, or crystallization from liquid solution
– A variety of materials are marketed in crystallized
form.
– Many are vacuum units where adiabatic evaporative
cooling induced supersaturation.
• Centrifugation
– a given particle settles under gravitational force at a
fixed maximum rate
– to increase the settling rate we replace the force of
gravity by a much stronger centrifugal force.
– More effective than gravity separators because they
will separate fine drops and particles and are much
smaller in size for a given capacity.
– Solids removal from gas: cyclones
• Materials handling
– Classification:
• characterization of solids by size and shape
• Done in a series of standard screens or woven wire test
sieves arranged serially on a stack, with the smallest mesh on
the bottom and the largest on top.
– Comminution
• Size reduction of solid particles
• For example, chunks of coke must be reduced to workable
size
• Compression, impact, attrition (rubbing) or cutting
• Crushers and grinders are good examples.
Unit Process: Reactors
• While not a unit operation, reactors are
essential process operations
• They are identified on flowsheets by the
type of vessel and their flow:
– Batch reactor
– Continuous stirred tank reactor (CSTR)
– plug flow or tubular reactor
• Batch reactor
– A tank or vessel where reactants have
been placed and products are removed
– There is no inflow or outflow of reactants
or products.
• Continuous Stirred Tank Reactor (CSTR)
– Run at steady state (ie no accumulation)
– Very well mixed
– Modelled as having no spatial variations in concentration,
temperature, pH or reaction rate in the vessel
– T an C are identical everywhere in the vessel, they are the same
at the exit as in the tank.
• Plug Flow or Tubular Reactor
– Consists of a cylindrical pipe
– Assume the flow is highly turbulent and there
is no radial variation in concentration.

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