Abstract
An oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) is a promising process to convert methane into ethylene and ethane; however, it suffers from the relatively low selectivity and yield of ethylene at high methane conversion. In this study, a membrane reactor is applied to the OCM process in order to prevent the deep oxidation of a desirable ethylene product. First, simulations of the OCM reactor based on mass and energy balances coupled with detailed OCM kinetic model are performed and effects of key operating parameters, such as temperature, methane-to-oxygen feed ratio and methane flow rate, on the OCM reactor performance in terms of CH4 conversion, C2 selectivity and yield are analyzed. To determine its optimal operating conditions, an optimization of the OCM membrane reactor using a surface response methodology is carried out in the second part. The central composite design (CCD) is used to study the interaction of process variables (i.e., temperature, feed flowrate and CH4/O2 ratio) and to find the optimum process operation to maximize the C2 products yield.
