Recovery of steam from condensate flash drum

[ponderer]

The medium pressure(14 barg) condensate in this refinery is sent to a condensate flash drum for recovery of low pressure(3.5 barg) steam.

We have found that the process unit which consume the LP steam near the condensate recovery unit suffer fluctuation of LP steam supply.

There is no flow meter and no control valve on the vapor line of the condensate flash drum, so we do not know the actual flow rate of recovered steam .

How to stabilize the flow rate of recovered steam?

The main medium pressure condensate is from steam trap downstream of some fractionator reboiler.

 

[Fzob]

It seems you have an imbalance between the MP condensate supply and the LP steam demand.

A solution is to install a pressure reducing valve from the MP steam to the LP steam to make up for the imbalance.

Regards

 

[roker]

the steam trap is not a stable flow element,
how do you flash from 14 to 3.r barg.
consider replacing the steam trap with a condensate pot for the reboiler, from the condensate pot you can control the flow to a flash drum and asure a constant LP steam flow,
if this flow is not enough you can add steam from another LP header or reduce the MP steam LP steam in a let down station, but the dteam shall be superheated.

regards,
roker