14.

Steam Condensate Collection Systems

You can imagine how I've become so smart on this subject.
Author explaining preference for total trap-out chimney trays in crude
distillation towers
Probably more process heaters and reboilers malfunction because of steam
condensate drainage problems than any other single cause. In most of the
plants in which I have worked, steam condensate recovery is 30% to 40%,
rather than 70% to 80%, because of this complex malfunction. The problem is
that we operate between two extremes:
Blowing the condensate seal
Condensate backup
Both conditions result in a loss of reboiler capacity, regardless of whether
the steam is on the shell side (vertical reboilers) or on the tube side
(horizontal reboilers).
I began my career as a process design engineer in 1965 for the long-vanished
American Oil Company. I recall the design of a stripper reboiler using 100
psig steam on the tube side. On my process owsheet diagram (PFD), I
showed 10,000 lb/hr of steam entering the top of the channel head of the
reboiler. Draining out from the bottom of the channel head, I indicated a ow
of 20 GPM of water at 340F. The 340F was the boiling point, or saturation
temperature, of 100 psig water. My pipe sizing chart indicated that a 20 GPM
ow of water required a line size of 1 inches for a line velocity of 4 ft/sec.
Steam Condensate Collection Systems