Air Separation Units (ASUs) Simulation Using Aspen Hysys^® at Oxinor I of Air Liquid Chile S.A Plant

Abstract

The method used to extract copper from its ores depends on the nature of the ore. The main process currently to separate copper from sulphide ores is the smelting process. The concentrated ore is heated strongly with silicon dioxide (silica), calcium carbonate and oxygen enriched air in a furnace or series of furnaces which is carried out using the injection of the air for oxidation the Fe and Si present in the raw material. Oxygen can be produced using several different methods. One of these methods is Air separation process, which separates atmospheric air into its primary components, typically nitrogen and oxygen, and sometimes also argon and other rare inert gases by cryogenic distillation. In this paper, simulation of air separation units (ASUs) was studied using Aspen Hysys®. The obtained simulation and model was validated with the operational data from the Oxinor I of Air Liquide S.A Plant. The ASU was divided into subsystems to perform the simulations. Each subsystem was validated separately and later on integrated into a single simulation. An absolute error of 1% and 1.5% was achieved between the simulated and observed the process variables(s). This indicated that Aspen Hysys® has the thermodynamic packages and required tools to perform simulations in cryogenic processes at industrial scale.

A Computer Simulator Model for Generating Sulphuric Acid and Improve the Operational Results, Using Operational Data from a Chemical Plant

“…In previous works like [11,19], the use and validation of results of the Aspen HYSYS® software has been presented, and other previous studies use some similar simulation process to learn and improve the results on chemical plants. For example, in [20], a model based on the simulation and analysis results of real operational cases in a Chilean plant is described.…”