Manufacture of ETHYLENE

Ethene is produced from the cracking of fractions obtained from distillation of natural gas and oil.
The processes are:
a)the steam cracking of ethane and propane (from natural gas and from crude oil)
b) the steam cracking of naphtha from crude oil
c) the catalytic dehydration over aluminium oxide catalyst.

1. ETHYLENE PRODUCTION VIA STEAM CRACKING OF ETHANE-PROPANE MIXTURE

Cracking and quenching. Initially, an ethane-propane mixture is fed to furnaces in which, under high-severity
conditions, it is cracked, forming ethylene, propylene and other byproducts. The furnace outlet stream is
subsequently fed to a water-based quench, to prevent further reactions and formation of undesirable byproducts.

From a decanter downstream from the quench tower, heavies, condensed dilution steam, tar and coke are removed.
Cracked gas from the quench is then directed to compression and separation.

Compression and drying. The compression of the cracked gas is performed across five stages. After the third stage
of compression, carbon dioxide and sulfur are removed from the cracked gas by caustic soda and water washes in a
caustic scrubber. The compressed cracked gas is cooled and subsequently dried by molecular sieves that remove
most of the water.

Separation. The dried cracked gas is fed to a cold box for the removal of hydrogen and light hydrocarbons, while
minimizing ethylene losses.

At this point, condensates from the chilling train are fed to a series of separation columns. In the first column
(demethanizer), methane is obtained from the top and further used in the cold box, while the bottom stream is fed to
a second column (deethanizer).

The top of the deethanizer, composed primarily of ethylene and ethane, is fed to an acetylene converter and then
fractionated in the C2-splitter. In this column, lights are removed from the overheads and recycled to the compression
system, while polymer-grade (PG) ethylene is drawn from the column as a side stream. Ethane, from C2-splitter
bottoms, is recycled to the cracking furnaces.
The deethanizer bottom stream is fed to a depropanizer, which distills C3 components in the overheads. This
overhead stream is catalytically hydrotreated for methyl acetylene and propadiene removal, and then fed to the C3-
splitter. In this column, lights are removed from the overheads and recycled to the compressors, while polymer-grade
(PG) propylene is drawn from the column as a side stream. Propane from C3-splitter bottoms is recycled to the
cracking furnaces. A C4+ stream is obtained from the depropanizer bottoms.

2. STEAM CRACKING OF NAPHTHA FROM CRUDE OIL

3. VIA CATALYTIC DEHYDRATION OVER ALUMINUM OXIDE CATALYST

The feed enters the process at a rate, a temperature and pressure of a 25 °C and 1 atm and at a composition of
wt% ethanol and wt% water.It is initially pressurized by centrifugal pump P-101 and subsequently heated by fired
heater F-101. The heated and pressurized feed enters fixed bed reactor R-101 and contacts with the aluminum oxide
catalyst. At this point it dehydrates to form the product, ethylene, as well as the byproducts water, hydrogen, diethyl
ether and acetaldehyde. Fired heater F-102 and reactor R-102 increase the overall conversion of the process. Both
fired heaters F-101 and F-102 are fueled with natural gas and fed with excess air. The composition of the reactor
train effluent is wt% ethylene, wt% water, wt% unreacted ethanol and trace amounts of diethyl ether, acetaldehyde,
and hydrogen contaminants.

The pressure of the reactor train effluent is increased by compressor K-102 and the temperature decreased by
exchange with cold water in heat exchanger E-201. The stream then expands and flashes in flash vessel FL-201,
which separates out the unreacted ethanol, and the water and virtually all of the acetaldehyde contaminant in the
bottoms while sending the ethylene-rich vapor phase out of the top. The top product of FL-202 is compressed by K-
202 and cooled by a freon refrigerant in E-202. At this point the stream is flashed for a second time in vessel FL-202
to remove additional impurities. The top outlet stream consists of wt% ethylene, which is fed to the bottom of a 10-
tray absorption column that removes a fraction of the residual diethyl ether as well as the remainder of the unreacted
ethanol. A stream of absorbent water is fed to the top of the column. The product exits the top of the column and has
a purity of ethylene. Diethyl ether makes up of the remaining product stream and is the primary contaminant. Trace
amounts of residual water and hydrogen are also present.