Development and application of oxygen-enriched sulfur recovery process

The enrichment oxygen sulfur recovery technology is a series of Claus processes in which air is replaced by pure oxygen or oxygen-enriched air to increase the treatment capacity of unit. It has been 30 years since COPE technology first put into production in 1985. According to the oxygen concentration in enrichment oxygen air, the enrichment oxygen technology could be divided into three types, namely low-level (the oxygen molar fraction is no more than 28%), medium-level (the oxygen molar fraction is no more than 50%) and high-level (the oxygen molar fraction is from 50% to about 100%). The suitable technology should be selected based on the concentration of H₂S and impurity need to be decomposed in acid gas when designing. As the temperature of combustion furnace can easily reach over 1 400 ℃ through burning in enrichment oxygen, the main design points are the selection of burner, refractory, the determination of oxygen concentration in air, as well as the temperature control system of furnace. Now huge amount of sulfur containing crude oil are refined and coal chemical industry is booming in China. Along with the issuing and putting into effect of GB 31570-2015 Emission Standard of Pollutants for Petroleum Refining Industry, the oxygen enrichment technology will be developed with a good prospect and should be paid full attention on.