Lanlian 30,000 Tons/y MEK Plant Design Perfection And Trial Production

MEK (Methyl Ethyl Ketone), is an excellent organic solvent, which can mutually dissolve many hydrocarbon solvents, and can dissolve various resins, fibrin esters as well. It is widely applied in painting, adhesion agent, lubricant dewaxing, magnetic tapes, synthetic leathers, printing inks, medicines and electronic elements and other industries. With the sustainable and high-speed economic development of China, especially the development of painting industry and adhesion agent industry, the MEK made in China could not meet the demand of consumers, and then resulted in the the relying on import for a long period of time. In 2003, the domestic MEK output is 73,500tons, while the import of MEK could reach up to 151,000tons, which cost foreign currency about USD93,000,000.In order to expand development field, and extend to petrochemcial industry, Lanzhou Petroleum Processing & Chemical Complex decided to utilize heavy C4 produced by Catalytic Cracking unit as the feedstock of Lanlian 30,000 tons/y MEK Plant, the purpose of which is to produce badly demanded MEK product, and improve economic added value of current resources so as to achieve better economic benefits. The total investment of the Plant is 195,000,000 yuan. It is consists of four major sections like butylene stripping, synthesizing of 2-methyl propanol, 2-methyl propanol refining, MEK synthesizing and refining; five auxiliary sections like process water treatment, thermo media, refrigeration station, circulating water, and tank farm. It inculdes over 130 various pumps, 13 towers, 5 reactors, 77 air coolers and heat exchangers, 70 vessels. The Max. operation pressure is 80kqf/cm2, the Max. operation temperature 300~C ,so it is a typical Class A explosion-proof plant with high temperature, high pressure, falmmablility, and explodablity, complicated process flow, and difficult startup.The author has participated in Lanlian 30,000 tons/y MEK project feasibility study, design review, staff training, plant commissioning, assessement and calibration, production management etc. And has put forward many rectification and perfection suggestions, which lay a good foundation for once-through commissioning and long term full load operation. Through a year's performance and calibration, the plant proves that all indices have reached or exceeded design values, yielded remarkable ecnomic results, and thus made great contributions to the enterprise.