Liquid sulfur cooling issue
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This post was last edited by liaifeng on 2018-8-1 at 10:59. Generally, sulfur recovery units use the method of cooling and granulating liquid sulfur. Is there a method of directly discharging liquid sulfur into a large tank and allowing it to cool naturally to produce solid sulfur? If so, what are the operational precautions? I hope those who understand this can kindly offer some guidance!
Sulfur granulation is mainly done to facilitate transportation and processing; it’s unlikely that anyone would be willing to use a large lump form of it!
The owner is so weird; they really have to do this :(
In this way, it’s impossible to guarantee the quality of the product. . . . Who to sell it to! Also, the smell is quite strong; something bad is going to happen!
A low sulfur output is acceptable, but it is not environmentally friendly. The workload is high.
Direct condensation of sulfur not only causes unpleasant odors at the site, but the gases that evaporate during emission contain hydrogen sulfide, posing a serious threat to the safety of the people present； Secondly, the direct condensation of liquid sulfur causes dust and other particles in the air to be incorporated into the sulfur solid, which affects the quality of the product ； Third, the direct condensation of liquid sulfur is not conducive to packaging ；
Indeed, the problems you mentioned do exist: there are unpleasant odors, dust, and so on. I think cooling such a large pool directly may not ensure that the product quality is uniformly up to standard. Then, even with purging in the degassing tank and subsequent discharge into the larger tank for solidification, isn’t it still very difficult to completely prevent the volatilization of hydrogen sulfide? Another point is that the owner has not considered implementing the liquid sulfur granulation and packaging method commonly used in China at present; it is planned to be adopted in the future, and for now this is only a temporary solution. So for now, the only option is to create a large pool where it can be left to dry like this. To be honest, maybe someone did this decades ago; definitely no one does it anymore in China. But the foreigners’ ideas still proved that my imagination isn’t enough. . . . :Q
By your words, is it feasible to allow a large pool of liquid sulfur to cool down naturally?? Is it not necessary to get some more cooling water?
This large-tank method was first used in small sulfur recovery units in the coal chemical industry, but the tanks still had to be shaped, using the most primitive drum granulators. At that time, environmental standards were not strict; there was no liquid sulfur degassing either, and the exhaust gases were sent directly back to the raw coal gas system.
Thank you for the reply. It seems this method has precedents. Also, I was wondering if there are any projects of this kind: for example, sulfur has other uses that require further processing, such as being used as an additive; is it possible to first pour the liquid sulfur into a large tank to cool it, and then process the solid sulfur?
You said it was used for other purposes; I haven’t been involved in that. My old factory adopted such a approach mainly because there wasn’t much pressure related to environmental regulations at that time, and since the sulfur processing unit was a subsidiary facility, cost control was a concern. It’s definitely not allowed these days – sulfur recovery processes must now meet specified emission standards, and the fluidized bed reactors need to be degassed.