Patent ID: 8133469

Claim:
A process comprising: (a) feeding an HBr-rich recycle stream comprising amine by-products from one or more commercial processes and having a pH of less than about 4 and a liquid comprising feed brine dilute in CaCl 2 and comprising at least about 10 wt % NaCl based on the total weight of the feed brine, either together or separately to an HBr absorption tower; (b) producing an aqueous HBr-rich stream in the HBr absorption tower; (c) feeding (i) at least a portion of the aqueous HBr-rich stream, and (ii) a portion of the feed brine, either together or separately to a bromine tower, such that production of shock-sensitive-by-products in the bromine tower is minimized; (d) oxidizing bromide moieties within the bromine tower with Cl 2 to produce Br 2 ; (e) recovering Br 2 from the bromine tower; (f) removing bromide-depleted bottoms from the bromine tower, such bottoms comprising less than about 35 wt % HCl; (g) adding a Ca ++ source to the bromide depleted bottoms to convert substantially all of the HCl in the bottoms to CaCl 2 ; (h) as necessary, removing water from the treated bottoms from (g) to produce a concentrated aqueous solution comprising from about 5 wt % CaCl 2 to about 40 wt % CaCl 2 ; and (i) recovering the concentrated aqueous solution comprising from about 5 wt % CaCl 2 to about 40 wt % CaCl 2 .