| US 7,563,360 B2 | ||
| Mercury-removal process in distillation tower | ||
| Yoshiyuki Yamaguchi, Sapporo (Japan); Senichiro Kaku, Musashino (Japan); and Kazutoshi Chaki, Ichihara (Japan) | ||
| Assigned to Japan Petroleum Exploration Co., Ltd., Tokyo (Japan) | ||
| Filed on Jan. 26, 2005, as Appl. No. 11/43,751. | ||
| Claims priority of application No. 2004-027192 (JP), filed on Feb. 03, 2004. | ||
| Prior Publication US 2005/0167335 A1, Aug. 04, 2005 | ||
| Int. Cl. C10G 45/00 (2006.01); B01D 3/00 (2006.01) | ||
| U.S. Cl. 208—251R [261/151; 261/127; 261/129; 261/130; 261/131; 202/82; 202/95; 202/163; 202/168; 202/177; 202/180; 202/183; 202/185.1; 202/202; 203/39; 203/40; 203/42; 203/44; 203/46; 203/78; 203/81; 203/91; 203/94] | 9 Claims |
| 1. A mercury-removal process, comprising:
holding a distillation tower in a gas/liquid equilibrium state where an inner temperature gradually decreases along an upward
direction, from a bottom temperature T2 of 300° C. at most to a top temperature T1 which is below the liquefying temperature of a light fraction;
feeding a mercury-containing liquid as a downflow and a stripping gas as an upflow into the distillation tower, whereby mercury
is transferred from the mercury-containing liquid to the stripping gas by countercurrent contact inside the distillation tower;
discharging the stripping gas with the transferred mercury as an exhaust gas from a top of the distillation tower through
an exhaust gas line to an adsorption tower; and
recovering the liquid from which mercury is stripped as a liquid product from a bottom of the distillation tower, wherein a part of the exhaust gas is cooled and returned to an upper zone of the distillation tower so as to keep the top
temperature T1 below the liquefying temperature of the light fraction.
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