Energy efficiency, investments and emissions in natural gas sweetening processes

GUTIERREZ JUAN PABLO; ALE RUIZ LILIANA; ELEONORA ERDMANN

Congreso; 23rd World Energy Congress 2016 Istanbul; 2016

World Energy Council

Currently, different technologies are employed for capturing the CO2 from the natural gas. Based onchemical phenomenon, the absorption of CO2 using alkanolamines is probably the more extendedprocess for the acid gas removal. However, membrane technologies are considered an alternative inparticular cases for their better performances, cleanness, energy requirements, operative costs andlocation flexibility.In this article, three different configurations for the CO2 removal were studied for treating aconventional natural gas stream from the north of Argentina. In the methodology, a regular processusing MDEA, an absorption process using recompressed vapor and a membrane system wereanalyzed with the aim of estimating the energy requirements and capital costs. In addition,compression and pump power, removed CO2, greenhouse gases emissions, water consumption,equivalent heat and investment costs were estimated for the three cases and compared. For thepurpose, the processes were simulated and studied using Aspen Hysys v8.8. After comparing thescenarios, the impact on the global energy efficiency was discussed.