Ammonia

Secondary Reforming

By:
Gerard B. Hawkins
Managing Director, CEO
Why have a Secondary Reformer ?

 Need nitrogen to make

ammonia
 Wish to make primary as small
as possible
 Wish to minimise methane slip
since methane is an inert in the
ammonia synthesis loop
 Other methods of achieving this
Braun Purifier process
 Can address all these with an
air blown secondary
 Secondary Reforming

 Secondary has three key components

Burner Gun
Mixing Volume
Catalyst
 All three must be right to obtain minimum
methane slip
 During normal operation difficult to tell
which one is causing a problem
 In general need to shut down and inspect
 Secondary Reforming
 Catalyst is typically loaded on top of inert
balls or lumps (low silica)
 Refractory arch in base of secondary
allows for Support of bed and inerts
Collection of gases
 On top of bed install a heat shield - made
of
• Tiles
• Large catalyst pellets
 Gives additional activity

 Large enough that moving catalyst is

very difficult
 Secondary Reforming

 Number of different types of burner gun

• John Zinc Shower head type
• JMC (Synetix) High Intensity Ring Burner
• Haldor Topsøe’s ring burner
• Similar to ours
 Aim of burner is to
• Mix intimately the process gas and oxidant
(air)
• Evenly distribute air
• Ensure no burning on burner tips
High Intensity Ring Burner Design
 Secondary Reforming
Mixing Volume

 If there is insufficient mixing volume,

• Variation of bed inlet temperature
• Variation of bed inlet composition
• Leads to poor usage of bed
• High methane slip
• Can change catalyst to improved version
• Reduce catalyst volume
• Increased mixing volume
 Secondary Reforming Catalysts

 Catalyst is robust
 Can not be poisoned due to high
temperature operation
Poisons will be passed to next unit
operation
 Can be affected by high temperatures
Will get color changes
 Can get bypassing
Leads to wide variations in flow per unit
volume
 Leads to higher than expected ATE’s
Comparison to other Technologies

Name Methanol Hydrogen Ammonia Ex Ammonia

Primary Ex Secondary
H2 70-73 70-73 68-71 54-58
CO 14-16 13-16 6-9 10-12
CO2 7-9 6-11 10-12 8-10
CH4 2-3 1-5 8-12 0.1-1.0
N2 0-1 0-1 0-1 22-26