1. Oil Refining & Natural Gas Industry

1.1 Low-Temperature Waste Heat Recovery at the Top of Crude Distillation Units (CDU/VDU)

In atmospheric and vacuum distillation units, the condensation latent heat of overhead oil and gas is substantial. However, due to its low temperature level, traditional shell-and-tube heat exchanger struggle to recover this heat effectively—hindered by low heat transfer coefficients and small actual heat transfer temperature differences—while consuming large volumes of cooling water.

Solution: TP Welded Plate Heat Exchanger (TP WPHE for short) can be used as overhead condenser. Its counter-flow heat transfer design enables deep heat exchange between hot and cold media, with end temperature differences controlled within 3–5°C.

Application Benefits:

Reduced Energy Consumption: Cuts cooling water usage by over 30% compared to shell-and-tube heat exchanger.

Higher Yield: Lower condensation temperatures minimize losses of light components such as naphtha and LPG in tail gas, directly boosting economic efficiency.

Lightweight & Load Reduction: The compact structure allows installation on overhead platform, significantly lowering structural steel load and civil engineering costs.

1.2 Natural Gas Purification

In natural gas processing plants, the amine absorption and regeneration cycle is the core process for removing acidic gases. The lean/rich amine interchanger serves as the key energy recovery equipment in the system. Rich amine, containing high concentrations of H₂S and CO₂, is highly corrosive. To reduce steam consumption in the regenerator reboiler, the heat exchanger must deliver maximum heat recovery efficiency.

Solution: SHPHE supplies TP WPHE fabricated from stainless steel or duplex steel. The high turbulence on the plate side not only enhances heat transfer efficiency (with a heat transfer coefficient typically three times that of shell-and-tube exchanger) but also inhibits deposition and scaling of amine degradation products on the plate surface.

Application Benefits: Operational data confirms that TP WPHE lowers the temperature of lean amine entering the absorber and raises the temperature of rich amine entering the regenerator, substantially reducing steam load of the reboiler and cooling load of the lean amine cooler.

1.3 FCC Tail Gas Waste Heat Recovery & Acid Dew Point Control

High-temperature flue gas discharged from fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) units contains sulfur oxides. When the temperature drops below the acid dew point, sulfuric acid condenses and corrodes equipment.

Solution: Through precise thermal calculations, SHPHE optimizes the wall temperature distribution of TP WPHE. Proprietary technology ensures plate temperatures remain consistently above the flue gas acid dew point, enabling waste heat recovery while avoiding low-temperature corrosion. For extreme operating conditions, C-276 Hastelloy plates are specified to ensure long-term, stable equipment operation.

2. Chemical Industry Applications

2.1 Acrylic Acid Production

Purification is the critical process for ensuring the purity of acrylic acid and its esters. Acrylic acid monomers are highly reactive; dead zones or excessive temperatures within heat exchangers readily induce popcorn polymerization, leading to channel blockage. Furthermore, the process medium contains organic acids, which are highly corrosive.

Solution: SHPHE supplied large-scale TP WPHE as overhead condensers for a major domestic 160,000-ton/year acrylic acid project. With a single unit heat transfer area of 7,300 m² and a weight of only 120 tons, the equivalent-capacity shell-and-tube unit would weigh over 360 tons. Its key advantages are as follows:

Dead-Zone-Free Flow Design: CFD-optimized flow channels eliminate dead zones, ensuring uniform residence time and fundamentally inhibiting polymerization.

Specialty Alloy Welding: Corrosion-resistant alloys paired with precision welding prevent corrosion and leakage.

Application Benefits: Post-commissioning, the unit reduces energy costs by 10% and cuts civil engineering and installation expenses by over 20%.

2.2 Chlor-Alkali & Sulfuric Acid Industries

Corrosion is the primary cause of equipment failure in concentrated brine cooling (chlor-alkali industry) and acid condensation (sulfuric acid plants), increasing maintenance costs and safety risks.

Solution:SHPHE offers mature material selection and welding processes for titanium (Ti), nickel (Ni), and Hastelloy. TP WPHE enables the most economical use of expensive materials in thin-plate form while delivering optimal corrosion resistance.

3. Power & New Energy Applications

3.1 Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) Power Generation Systems

ORC technology recovers low-temperature waste heat (e.g., geothermal heat, industrial waste heat) for power generation using low-boiling organic working fluids. TP WPHEs serve as evaporators and condensers in ORC systems.

As Evaporator: Withstands flue gas temperatures up to 900°C and efficiently transfers heat to organic working fluids. The compact plate bundle structure significantly reduces working fluid charge, lowering system costs and safety risks.

As Condenser: Superior counter-flow heat transfer ensures full liquefaction of working fluids at low pressure, increasing turbine expansion ratio and directly improving power generation efficiency.

Application Benefits: In a blast furnace gas waste heat power generation project at a steel plant, replacing shell-and-tube exchanger with TP WPHE increased system power generation efficiency by about 5%, while cutting the equipment footprint to 1/4 of the original.

3.2 Mechanical Vapor Recompression (MVR) Systems

MVR technology recovers latent heat by compressing secondary vapor and serves as a core technology for modern industrial wastewater zero liquid discharge (ZLD).

Solution: For the treatment of landfill leachate or high‑salinity wastewater, TP WPHE features straight‑through, wide channels on the tube side, enabling smooth flow of fluids with suspended crystals or high viscosity and preventing clogging. The fully welded structure withstands negative‑pressure evaporation conditions in MVR systems, eliminating energy efficiency losses caused by air infiltration.