Patent ID: 9527784
Filing Date: 2016-12-27
CPC Classification: B01J,C07C,C10G,F25J

Claim Text:
1. A process for producing hydrocarbon compounds via oxidative coupling of methane (OCM), comprising: combining a feedstock gas comprising methane with an oxygen-containing gas comprising oxygen to produce a combined gas; bringing the combined gas in contact with an OCM catalyst in an OCM reactor to generate an OCM reactor effluent stream that includes ethylene and unreacted methane; separating the OCM reactor effluent stream into at least a first stream, a second stream, and a third stream; expanding at least a portion of the first stream substantially isentropically to produce an expanded first stream and expanding at least a portion of the third steam substantially isentropically to produce an expanded third stream; directing the expanded first stream and the second stream to a separations unit to separate at least a portion of a mixture of the expanded first stream and the second stream into a first effluent stream comprising ethylene and a second effluent stream comprising unreacted methane, wherein the separations unit is operated at a first temperature that is less than 25° C. and at a first pressure that is greater than 1 atmosphere; and separating at least a portion of the second effluent stream and at least a portion of the expanded third stream in an additional separations unit to provide a methane-rich effluent and a nitrogen-rich effluent.