Vapor–liquid separator
A vapor-liquid separator is a vertical vessel used in several industrial applications to separate a vapor-liquid mixture. Gravity causes the liquid to settle to the bottom of the vessel, where it is withdrawn.[1][2][3][4] The vapor travels upward at a design velocity which minimizes the entrainment of any liquid droplets in the vapor as it exits the top of the vessel.
The feed to a vapor-liquid separator may also be a liquid that is being partially or totally flashed into a vapor and liquid as it enters the separator.
A vapor-liquid separator may also be referred to as a flash drum, knock-out drum, knock-out pot, compressor suction drum or compressor inlet drum.
When used to remove suspended water droplets from streams of air, a vapor-liquid separator is often called a demister.
Where vapor-liquid separators are used
Vapor-liquid separators are very widely used in a great many industries and applications, such as:
- Oil refineries
- Natural gas processing plants
- Petrochemical and chemical plants
- Refrigeration systems
- Air conditioning
- Compressor systems for air or other gases
- Gas pipelines
- Steam condensate flash drums
- Geothermal power plants
- Combined Cycle Power Plants
See also
- Flash evaporation
- Vapor-compression refrigeration
- Souders-Brown equation (for sizing vapor-liquid separators)
- Steam drum
References
- ^ William D. Baasel (1990). Preliminary Chemical engineering Plant Design (2nd ed.). Van Nostrand Reinhold. ISBN 0-442-23440-6. OCLC 18907139.
- ^ David H.F. Liu (1997). Environmental Engineers' Handbook (2nd ed.). CRC Press. ISBN 0-8493-9971-8. OCLC 35886123.
- ^ Stanley S. Grossel (2004). "Design and sizing of knock-out drums/catchtanks for emergency relief systems". Plant/Operations Progress (AIChE). 5 (3): 129–135. doi:10.1002/prsb.720050304. ISSN 0278-4513.
{{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter|month=ignored (help) - ^ Stanley M. Walas (1988). Chemical Process Equipment:Selection and Design. Butterworth-
Heinemann. ISBN 0-409-90131-8. OCLC 16714037.
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External links
- Gas-Liquid Separation Technology Scroll to page 10 of the brochure.
- Experimental Characterization of High-Pressure Natural Gas Scrubbers by Trond Austrheim (preprints of papers based on PhD Thesis at the University of Bergen, Norway, 2006)
- Flash Steam Tutorial The benefits of recovering flash steam, how it is done and typical applications.
- Quick Calculator for Horizontal Knock Out Drum sizing Based on minimum time required for liquid droplets of a given minimum size to be separated.
- Design Criteria for Vapor/Liquid Separators
- Detailed explanation of high performance vapor-liquid separators (scrubbers)