EQUIPMENT DESCRIPTION

All of the equipments used in the plant are chosen to be constructed of stainless
steel. This is due to corrosive water in the streams and high pressure.

REACTOR
For cost estimations, the Packed Bed Reactor (PBR) is assumed to be a process
vessel. The capacity needed for the cost estimations is the volume of the reactor.
This was found the same way as for the pre-reformer and ATR in the direct method.
The same cost estimation method as in the direct method is used here.11111111 In
this section, designing a plug flow reactor for multi reaction and nonisothermal
condition has been done. this reactor is supported with a heat exchange to remove
the heat generated from the exothermic reaction. in this designing section, mole
balances were considered to be in the form of the final mole which is the remaining
at the end of the reaction period. Since the reaction is parallel, taking in mind the
reaction rates is too important by combining all these rates for each material. Then
evaluating the rest of these rate using the stoichiometric coefficients. Evaluating
the concentration of each material were done in which all the pressure and
temperature effect was considered. Here one assumption was used which is the
ideality of the gas introduced to the reactor.

STORAGE TANKS
For the cost estimations all of the storage tanks are assumed to be API, fixed roof
tanks made of stainless steel. The cost calculations for the tanks needed to store
Methanol and Water are done in the same way as for the storage tanks in the direct
method.
COMPRESSOR
The compressor used in the plant is assumed to be a centrifugal compressor made
of stainless steel. It is assumed that the energy required to compress a gas is the
energy found in the workbook. In reality, there is an efficiency factor involved. This
factor has not been counted in when estimating the electric power needed for the
plant.
HEAT EXCHANGERS
All of the heat exchangers in the plant are assumed to be shell and tube, floating
head and stainless steel. The reason for this choice is the same as for the direct
plant. The estimation of the cost for the heat exchanger is done the same way as for
the exchangers in the direct plant.
PUMP
The pump used in the plant is assumed to be centrifugal, electric drive and made of
stainless steel. Pump selection is based on flow rate and head required. In addition
special care should be made when considering corrosion (in this process some water
is present, and the pressure is high).
TOWER
There are two towers in this plant. The towers in the plant are distillation columns
with sieve trays. The ideal numbers of trays were found by scaling up the number of
trays. The first distillation column known as DME Tower meanwhile the second
distillation column known as Methanol Tower.