Utilization of Flare Gas for Direct Non-Oxidative Production of Liquid Fuels and Chemicals

Natural gas flaring produces 400 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions annually [1]. The current gas-to-liquids technology such as Fischer-Tropsch process requires two stages with synthesis gas (CO + H₂) as intermediate, which is extremely capital-intensive and not economically viable for stranded gas utilization. Other technology, e.g., the oxidative coupling process is difficult to scale up. This project will develop a process that enables direct and continuous conversion of flare gas into liquid hydrocarbon fuels. In this process, an initiator was used to facilitate the dissociation of alkanes, which can be converted into liquid hydrocarbons (benzene, toluene, xylenes, mesitylenes, etc) using highly selective zeolite catalysts. This direct conversion will considerably simplify the process, decrease the capital cost and avoid the use of expensive precious metal catalysts and corrosive activators. Therefore, the novel one-step gas-to-liquids process is obviously superior to the current state-of-the-art processes. Moreover, it is expected that the techno-economics of the one-step process will be attractive. This technology has the potential to eliminate flaring for the shale gas industry.

 

References

[1] http://www.theenergyexchange.co.uk/partner/global-gas-flaring-reduction-ggfr.