Cameron International Corporation

Cameron Solutions, Inc.

Petronas Carigali Sdn Bhd

National Tank Company

Richard D Peters

Ankur D Jariwala

George E Mahley, Iii

Atsushi Morisato

Faizal Bin Mohamad Fadzillah

Hatarmizi Bin Hassan

Faudzi Mat Isa

Fatimah Binti A Karim

Zalina Binti Ali

Wan Atikahsari Wan Zakaria

Faizal Bin Fadzillah

George E Mahley

Wan Atikahsari Zakaria

Fatimah Binti Karim

A pretreatment system and method for a floating liquid natural gas ('FLNG') facility are presented. The inlet natural gas stream flows through a membrane system to remove carbon dioxide and a heat exchanger, producing first and second cooled CO-depleted non-permeate streams. The first cooled CO-depleted non-permeate stream is routed to additional pretreatment equipment, while the second cooled CO-depleted non-permeate stream is routed directly to a LNG train. Alternatively, the inlet natural gas stream may flow through a membrane system to produce a single cooled CO-depleted non-permeate stream that is routed to the LNG train after sweetening and dehydration. Because the pretreatment system delivers the incoming gas stream to the LNG train at a lower temperature than conventional systems, less energy is needed to convert the gas stream to LNG. In addition, the pretreatment system has a smaller footprint than conventional pretreatment systems.

Floating liquefied natural gas pretreatment system

A membrane permeation system and process accommodates varying acid gas inlet concentrations over time while utilizing only the initially installed equipment and still maintaining the non-permeate gas specification. The system and process provide flexibility to operate efficiently over a wide range of inlet COconcentrations by adjustments to primary permeate, secondary permeate, and recycle gas operations. The glassy polymer membrane devices used in the system and process are selected so removal duty efficiency increases as acid gas concentration increase. Designing the system and process to handle about a 15% increase in acid gas concentrations over initial conditions effectively treats acid gas concentrations well above that 15% increase, thereby eliminating the need for additional equipment or for additional downstream amines and physical solvents.

Process design for acid gas removal

A natural gas stream is passed through a single membrane element that is fabricated with two or more distinct types of membrane fibers. The membrane fibers have different characteristics in order to reduce the number of membrane elements required for gas separation and to improve gas separation performance due to changing gas composition because of permeation as the gas travels through the membrane element.

Membrane filter element with multiple fiber types

Growing community of inventors

Katy, TX, United States of America

Richard D Peters