Abstract
The amine unit plays a vital role for reducing the sulphur levels in the petroleum refining and gas processing industries. The requirement for an efficient and reliable separation system for the removal of gases such as H2S and CO2 has become an important requirement for gas processing. Amine treatment has proved to be the principal commercially established method for gas/liquid purification by the removal of H2S and CO2. Diethanolamine (DEA) is used as a reagent in the sweetening process unit at a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) plant in the Gulf of Suez Petroleum Company (GUPCO) in Egypt. Impurities known as heat stable salts (HSS) are formed and gradually accumulated inside this unit. Therefore, the total corrosion from the coupon samples was calculated to be 18 mils per year (MPY) (0.457 mm/year) inside the unit. This emphasized that corrosion related problems cost the gas industry millions of dollars leading to low production as well as damaged equipment. By using the CORR 11631 A corrosion inhibitor from NALCO champion company and performing preliminary calculations it was found that the novel process reduced the corrosion rate from 18 MPY to 3 MPY. A feasibility study of the corrosion inhibitor was performed and the loss of production based on mass flow rate was determined. The optimization results showed that the use of corrosion inhibitor at a concentration of 50 parts per million (ppm) is the most recommended process.