High Temperature Compatible, Field-Deployable Heat Exchanger Nanocomposite Treatments

Abstract

Abstract Fouling of refinery reboilers is a major source of production loss, health, safety, and environment (HSE) issues, and increased carbon emissions. Reboilers can be especially difficult, as fouling is difficult to address without major cleaning operations, and anti-fouling solutions outside of design modifications are limited. Formulation development of a novel coating material for reboiler systems examined a wide variety of polymer and nanocomposite chemistries. An iterative development process was used to identify and synthesize a polymer nanocomposite surface treatment to protect against corrosion induced by the buildup of chloride and sulfide salts typically found within distillation reboilers. Application on carbon steel test panels was completed using industry standard spray application methods and subsequently characterized for adhesion strength, thermal stability, chemical compatibility, and corrosion mitigation. Data included in this study will demonstrate that the material has a durability comparable to existing state-of-the-art coating materials (following ASTM D3359), chemical resistance to high acid and base solutions, and corrosion resistance (following ASTM B117) to support the long-term use of this novel surface treatment to protect metallic surfaces in harsh process conditions. Use of this novel material, compatible up to 350°C, has suggested the overall lifetime of the candidate reboiler system could be increased 2-fold based on previous applications of similar materials in field deployment. This non-fluorinated, highly chemically resistant surface treatment can offer significant cost avoidance through the improvement of operational uptime and reduced maintenance costs in heat transfer applications typically susceptible to corrosion and fouling.