Patent ID: 8501034

Claim:
A process for purifying brine comprising: (1) providing an aqueous brine solution comprising one or more. inorganic salts and one or more organic compounds; and (2) conducting at least one unit operation for removing at least a portion of the one or more organic compounds from the aqueous brine solution to obtain at least a first purified brine solution; wherein at least about 80 weight-percent of the one or more inorganic salts of the aqueous brine solution provided in step (1) is sodium chloride; and wherein the at least one unit operation comprises a first redissolution operation comprising: (a) crystallizing sodium chloride in the aqueous brine solution to form sodium chloride crystals and a first mother liquor; (b) separating the sodium chloride crystals from the first mother liquor; (c) redissolving the separated sodium chloride crystals in an aqueous solution having an organic compound concentration substantially less than the organic compound concentration in the aqueous brine solution provided in step (1) to obtain a first purified brine solution; and (d) crystallizing a first mother liquor purge streams from the first mother liquor to produce a recycle salt stream that is fed hack to the step (a) wherein the first mother liquor purge stream from this step (d) has a reduced volume of organic-containing purge.