State-of-the-art assessment of natural gas liquids recovery processes: Techno-economic evaluation, policy implications, open issues, and the way forward

Although many improved conceptual designs of natural gas liquids (NGLs) recovery processes have been introduced to enhance the economics and efficiency, real-world applications remain elusive because of the communication gap between researchers and practitioners. To bridge this gap, a state-of-the-art assessment of the NGLs recovery processes is presented along with an overall outline considering the feed conditions, product recovery, purity, specific energy consumption (SEC), process economics, and analysis software using the equation of state model. Lower NGL components in the feed have a higher SEC and lower operating costs than a rich feed. It was also found that the conceptual processes are more energy intensive and complex than commercial processes. The major challenges associated with NGL recovery were assessed, including a high energy consumption, varying feed composition, flexibility in the product recovery, and design considerations for offshore NGL processing. Future directions are proposed, including the application of hybrid separation processes and a process intensification to enhance the compactness, particularly for offshore applications, process optimization, and heat integration. Further, an economic policy study is conducted that provides insight into market dynamics. The development of new natural gas (NG) reserves will boost the NGL market and NG business.