Hydrogen purity
Thread Content
In a hydrogenation unit, a constant turbine speed combined with an increase in the amount of circulating hydrogen indicates a decrease in hydrogen purity. How should this sentence be understood?
Hydrogen has a lower density compared to impurities; the more impurities there are, the higher the density! The flow meter will show a high value!
There is a problem with this statement. If the speed of the turbine remains constant and the amount of circulating hydrogen increases, it only indicates that the reaction pressure has risen. The reason for this increase in reaction pressure could be an increased load on the fresh hydrogen compressor; if that’s the case, then the hydrogen partial pressure should increase, which means the purity of hydrogen should rise rather than drop. It can also be caused by the system stopping the emission of waste hydrogen; in this case, the purity of the hydrogen naturally decreases. So it depends on the specific situation.
It seems that the issue here is related to the display of the flow meter; probably the molecular weight is too high, which causes the displayed values to be higher