| dc.description.abstract | Gas-to-liquid (GTL) process involves the chemical conversion of natural gas (or other
gas sources) into synthetic crude that can be upgraded and separated into different useful
hydrocarbon fractions including liquid transportation fuels. A leading GTL technology is
the Fischer Tropsch process. The objective of this work is to provide a techno-economic
analysis of the GTL process and to identify optimization and integration opportunities
for cost saving and reduction of energy usage and environmental impact. First, a basecase
flowsheet is synthesized to include the key processing steps of the plant. Then,
computer-aided process simulation is carried out to determine the key mass and energy
flows, performance criteria, and equipment specifications. Next, energy and mass
integration studies are performed to address the following items: (a) heating and cooling
utilities, (b) combined heat and power (process cogeneration), (c) management of
process water, (c) optimization of tail-gas allocation, and (d) recovery of catalystsupporting
hydrocarbon solvents. Finally, an economic analysis is undertaken to
determine the plant capacity needed to achieve the break-even point and to estimate the
return on investment for the base-case study. After integration, 884 million $/yr is saved
from heat integration, 246 million $/yr from heat cogeneration, and 22 million $/yr from
water management. Based on 128,000 barrels per day (BPD) of products, at least 68,000
BPD capacity is needed to keep the process profitable, with the return on investment
(ROI) of 5.1%. Compared to 8 $/1000 SCF natural gas, 5 $/1000 SCF price can increase
the ROI to 16.2%. | en |
