Maximum Liquefaction of Gases Revisited

Abstract

Joule-Thomson liquefiers are the commonest machines to liquefy gases. Over the years, countless number of articles have been published on the subject. Dozens of 1st and 2nd law analyses were carried out on Joule-Thomson liquefaction cycles. And yet an aspect of purely theoretical interest seems to have passed unnoticed, namely: for a given volume of gas, what conditions should be fulfilled to achieve maximum liquefaction without considering engineering details of design equipment and the highly irreversible character of work-consuming devices, heat exchangers, heat leaks and the throttling process. This work addressed this issue by applying the 1st law analysis and elementary calculus prescriptions to a simple Linde-Hampson liquefying process. The same approach could be applied to other liquefying cycles. As is well-known, for a given mass flow rate of a gas, maximum fraction liquefied occurs when the pre-cooling temperature, Ti , and initial pressure, Pi , lie on the inversion curve. It has been proved that this is only true if an additional condition is fulfilled. Expressions for it were derived for the van der Waals, RKS and PR equations of state.

Keywords

• Liquefaction of gases
• Joule-Thomson effect
• maximum fraction liquefied
• inversion curves
• liquefier

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