Cryogenic air separation – the most efficient method for the production of gaseous and liquid oxygen – can be modified to manufacture a range of desired products and mixes and typically calls for sequential steps (see Figure 1).
Following air compression, the air pre-treatment step consists of cooling and purification to remove process contaminants, such as H2O, carbon dioxide (CO2), and hydrocarbons. Purification is essential to this process, as impurities can freeze in the downstream heat exchangers and cryogenic separation equipment, inevitably causing product quality impairment and/or system damage.
The most common purification methods are Temperature Swing Adsorption (TSA), which exploits the difference in adsorption capacity of adsorbents at different temperatures, and Pressure Swing Adsorption (PSA), which operates similarly via pressure variations.
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