Air Products and Chemicals, Inc.

Jun S Choe

Lyndon J Kellogg, Jr

A membrane-assisted process to produce ammonia is set forth wherein the recycle stream from the ammonia process containing primarily unreacted hydrogen and nitrogen but also containing inerts and unrecovered ammonia is separated in a first ammonia-selective membrane separator into a permeate stream enriched in ammonia and a non-permeate stream enriched in hydrogen, nitrogen and the inerts which is recycled to the reactor feed. A key to the present invention is that the permeate stream enriched in ammonia is recycled to the reactor effluent. In one embodiment of the present invention, the purge stream from the ammonia process (which represents that portion of the recycle stream which must removed from the process in order to prevent the build-up of the inerts in the process) is separated in a second ammonia-selective membrane separator into a permeate stream enriched in ammonia which is recycled to the reactor feed and a non-permeate stream enriched in hydrogen, nitrogen and the inerts which can be further processed for hydrogen recovery. A key to this embodiment is that a portion of the reactor feed is used to sweep the permeate side of the second membrane separator.

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Harleysville, PA, United States of America

Jun S Choe