Helium Liquefaction by Reverse Brayton-Cycle Cryogenic Refrigeration
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Abstract
Helium liquefaction is an energy-intensive process that often serves as a limiting step for the recovery of limited Helium resources from natural gas feeds. Starting from a feed of 10 MMSCFD of natural gas, we account for the entire process of sweetening, hydrocarbon fractionation, nitrogen rejection, LNG production, and Helium purification and liquefaction. We propose a novel multi-expander liquefaction design complete with liquid nitrogen pre-cooling, with energy savings of 36.1 % compared to the existing models of liquefaction typically used for Helium liquefaction. Additionally, the energy savings allow us break even on capital expenditures despite the increased equipment count, thus giving us the advantage in both energy savings and purchase costs. Thus, our project accomplishes the following: 1) Estimate and account for every major process unit in the typical treatment of natural gas to co-produce NGL and LNG, 2) Model a novel liquefaction design using the Reverse-Brayton refrigeration cycle and 3) Optimize the specific power to 0.701 kW-hr/L for liquefaction, surpassing existing liquefaction designs to save on energy usage. Assuming a cost of capital of 15%, a plant lifetime of 15 years, liquid Helium sales price of $30/L, and a natural gas feed consisting of 4.53% Helium, a plant built according to our design has an ROI of 127.85%, and IRR of 45.37%, and an NPV of $247,395,300.